Rebooting Dark Shadows
by Maryland Rose
Summary: An attempt to reboot Dark Shadows, as if they allowed me to be in charge...
1. Chapter 1

Notes for reboot:

DS is due for a reboot, as the original series had some serious flaws, which we overlooked in our enthusiasm - for it was truly different and groundbreaking - but when seen it retrospect, we cannot avoid seeing (check Danny Horn's "Dark Shadows every day" for a pitiless, if funny critique).

The series also feels dated. Even if did not allude to current events, the underlying society expectations of those days are very much part of the fabric, as the writers were not aware of them since it was the reality they lived, and those assumptions now clash with our own sensibilities.

For example, those who were not part of the "normal" world were seen in need of cures to be accepted. Remember how many light skinned black tried to "pass", to deceive others into thinking they were white (there was even an Ellery Queen novel, back in the thirties, I think, where the murderer was just one such "passing" black, protecting his shameful secret). Gays submitted themselves to all kinds of weird therapies that would make Eric Lang sensible by comparison. Franklin Roosevelt deceived everybody as to the extent of his disability, making it seem as if he could somehow walk. Well, now it is the time of "black and proud", the time where a top rated comedy show featuring a gay couple whose life revolves about raising their adopted daughter and dealing with all the others in their families – and where a severely crippled woman does a victory dance on her artificial legs when she gets elected to Congress.

So it would be a worthwhile shift to go from trying to cure Barnabas to have him accept his condition and make the best of it. Of course, for that we need to establish that,unless there is something else going on, the effects of Barnabas' feeding are, at worst, very much like a bad cold. You are weak and need to stay in bed, you moan and groan, and think that you are going to die, and in a few days you are good as new. That changes when he is freaking out, or under strain, or fighting an enemy. He has to occupy the same space as Henry Fitzroy of "Blood Ties" or the vampires of "Kindred: the embraced" where feeding is not seen unless a plot point hangs on it.

As for other issues, the ideal format would be that of a weekly series with complete episodes that span a narrative arc. This keeps the characters from being idiots who spend weeks and weeks not figuring what the audience already knows. They have problems which they solve, and if the main issue takes a while, it is because they find clues slowly ,and some of them are contradictory. (This is the current format for series nowadays, and we see why it is a successful formula).

In this format people have less patience with slow character development. Barnabas has to be sympathetic (though deluded) from the beginning. Forget HODS. It is a great movie, but it ends with everyone dead, Barnabas destroyed, and no chance for an encore. Barnabas might be terrifying when he loses his marbles, but never vile.

Since the format is likely to be a weekly series with overriding arcs, there won't be the luxury of dropping plot threads in the hope that in a few months no one will remember. Proper groundwork and foreshadowing must reach full development , and stories must reach a satisfactory conclusion. Or the hint of another story coming soon.

When a character story is done, the character should not hang around hoping for something to do. They can go out into the wide world, to do something else, or to get away from painful memories, and come back only when they have another story in them. Of course they might come in for short spells to deliver important information, or just ominous warnings. But it is not too hard for another story to be found. For example Liz's story is that she thought she murdered her husband and locked herself in her house, guarding the "corpse". Well, that is over,, what do you do with her? 1) She decides to go on a tour to make up for what she missed and 2) when she comes back, she realizes that both Carolyn and Roger are doing as they please and are not willing to have her dictate how they should live. That sets up a conflict that will be played out for a long while, and which makes her a weak link that enemies seek to exploit.. She may be the one who brings in the Leviathan box and sets the cult in her own living room.

Burke Devlin? His story should end when Roger confesses. What is he going to do with himself now? Well, there are another issues that will come to the fore. Actually (and I thank Pat McCray for the suggestion), he is kind of a James Bond for a supernatural tracking task force. He may come back every now and then, gun in hand, to help out when needed, and to continue his on/off relationship with Vicky. He may come to help defeat the Leviathan, for example. He does have a gun and uses it when needed. At some time, when incapacitated, loans the gun to Barnabas (You know how to use this, right?)

Quentin?... Quentin might come back once in a while to retrieve something, or to end his story with Amanda. Or to confront Beth's ghost or whatever. But once his business is done he disappears again.. Think about it. A man with his tastes and adventurous spirit, would he hang around long in a one horse town like Collinsport? Is he really that fond of Barnabas that he would stay there when there is nothing for him to do? He can show up every now and then to deliver some information, (or retrieve useful information - getting Vicky to do his research..) but then he'd be gone and no one would trace him.

Most important - Angelique: The story of Angelique and Barnabas is too much like the story of Rusalka/Ondine/The little mermaid. A supernatural creature who loves a mortal man and wants to join him, only to have him fall for another, and tragedy ensues. Let's get rid of the "witch" and "devil worshiper" angle and make Angelique a nymph, or fairy creature who falls for Barnabas and wants to be loved by him as a mortal woman. She is one of the fair folk and thus her sense of right and wrong does not conform to human standards (Fairies are not known for compassion nor mercy). Her mistake is that instead of seeking to be loved for herself, she uses a spell on Barnabas, which is not strong enough when he falls in love with Josette

If Angelique is no witch, then Nicholas is no warlock in the sense of devil worshiper. He is a sorcerer, corrupted by his power, who looks on regular humans with contempt. But no Satanism, no summoning the Devil - Talk of the Devil ends up with talks of God, and it is better not to let TV writers venture into doing theology (they do it badly) - So, to create Eve, Nicholas he does not call upon "the most wicked woman in the world" (there are worse pretenders to the title) but provides a body to a will-of-the-wisp, who is mischievous as all fairies, but now with a human body can do a lot more damage.

And now what a reboot done by me would be like...


	2. Introduction

David's attempt on his father

Victoria Winters is going to Collinsport to start work as a governess. She is excited because she hopes to do some historical research while she is there (she is a "history buff" that subscribes to a couple of magazines and likes to correspond with fellow buffs - including a Professor Stokes). Others are not so sure about her burying herself on a one horse town where blizzards are a way of life. They theorize that she got fascianted by the past as a way to escape the circumstances of growing up an orphan.

In Collinsport, handyman Willie Loomis tries to flirt with waitress Maggie Evans, only to be rebuffed by her fiance Joe Haskell, who berates Loomis for being an ex-con. "The difference between you and me is that I got caught... " Willie mutters, as a way of reminding Joe of the illegal runs he uses his boat for (money is tight, and he is tempted by the big money that organized crime may bring him).

Roger and Elizabeth have an argument. Elizabeth says that since David was expelled from school, he will be taught at home. Roger says that David does not need a governess but a psychiatrist, as he was expelled for trying to burn the school "It was an accident, Roger. Like the one you were involved with" she reminds him. She reminds him that she is the one who runs the business, after the mess he made of his life, because he wanted to be an artist, instead of attending to his duty as the son of the family. "And who says that because I was born a man I have to bury myself in an office? I had talent, Elizabeth. I could have made something of myself." "Like Sam Evans, who is drunk half the time, and needs his daughter to support him?"

Roger grumbles but knows that he cannot change things. He hopes that David does not burn Collinwood. Of that he waits until he (Roger) is out to do it.

Maggie has finished work, and is at home, with her computer, doing some freelance work that might get her some extra cash. Sam Evans jokes about her being a hacker. Maggie sighs... Well, you need a lot of different skills to survive...

Carolyn talks with her mother. Like Roger, she worries about David, and does not think it wise to keep him at home. Elizabeth tells her that she does not make the decisions, and that she forgets the agreement she made. "To be a dutiful daughter" Carolyn says. "Would you have rather gone to jail?" "Sometimes I think I should have. This is a different jail. Look at you. You have locked yourself in here. You are in jail. Why are you in jail, mother?"

Willie Loomis goes to the attic to look for parts to repair some broken furniture. In the attic he finds several old portraits, covered in cobwebs. He finds Barnabas' portrait and he hears a beating heart...

Vicky arrives at Collinwood, and is welcomed by Elizabeth. Carolyn is curt with her. "Why come to live here when you don't have to?" she asks her.

Roger is out at the Blue Whale getting drunk when he sees Burke Devlin come through the door.

When everyone falls asleep, Willie goes out, drawn by the sound of the beating heart. He gets into the cemetery, into the crypt, and finds the chained coffin. He unlocks it and Barnabas' hand reaches out and grabs him...


	3. David tries to kill Roger I

David attempts to kill Roger, part II

Roger confronts Burke Devlin who says "I will make sure you pay for what you did to me." "What are you going to do to me, lock me inside with my crazy sister? Put me in the same house which will go up in flames when my kid finds the matches? Put me to work in a job I hate?... No, there is nothing that you can do to me."

Burke promises to ruin the family, and take their business from them. "Please do. Then I can become a drunken artist, inteast of a drunk. Maybe I may become a good painter. And take away the kid, too. So you can deal with his firebug tendencies. I will swear in court that he is your son."

There are reports of cattle killed, and they blame wolves or bears... a wounded bear that cannot hunt game as well, so goes after more docile prey. "The problem is that it might go after people" they say, and they start patrolling for it. Someone says that there does not seem to be much blood spilled, but they shrug it off.

Willie sneaks in to the Old House where Barnabas is catching rats. He cannot hide his disgust. "I have to have blood." Barnabas says. "What are you?" "I was once a man like you. And then I made some wrong choices. Now I need blood. I need human blood but I am so hungry that if I feed off them I will kill them." "You did not kill me." "I had summoned you. I had a link with you and I recognized you as one of mine" Willie says that for now they blame the dead cattle on wolves or bears. Barnabas says that he will start hunting wildlife, and let the townspeople think that the predator died on its own.

Barnabas says that he must not be caught. He tells Willie that he is afraid that if he is caught, they will lock him in a chained coffin again. "Willie, promisse me to kill me before they do that to me. Please, cut off my head. Or drive a stake through my heart. Do not let me be locked in that coffin again." Willie promises him that he will do it. Then Barnabas starts asking him questions about the new world he finds himself it.

Burke meets Vicky, who acts hostile to him, as she sees him threatening her employers. He says that he has a legitimate grudge against them. She tells him that he should be able to get over it, considering that he is now a rich man. "If I had your money, I would not dwell on what went wrong in the past, but I would enjoy it, and do what I really want to do" "And what would be that?" "Historical research and write a book. Maybe several" They continue this conversation, and Burke invites her for a cup of coffee at the Blue Whale.

Carolyn and Roger commiserate together, over a bottle of brandy. "I do not know if I should fear or welcome the prospect of David burning down this place", Roger says and Carolyn grimly agrees. She says that she might cozy up to Devlin and maybe get an inkling of what he wants to do. "If he wants Collinwood, tell him to take it."

Maggie and Joe have an argument, about Joe going off in his boat. "Joe, I know what you use that boat for." "It is for us, baby. I do not make enough money fishing. You make only minimum wage, and a big chunk goes for you father's booze, and so you need all those freelance things. I am also freelancing." "But it is dangerous." "I can take care of myself"

Roger's car goes out of control and it crashes.


	4. David tries to kill Roger II

Roger is not hurt, and when he complains that Burke is trying to kill him, he is reminded that he had been drinking, and be glad that he had not hurt anyone else.

Carolyn sneaks into Burke's room and begins looking into his papers. She hears him come in and she quickly adopts a seductive pose. "Surprise!" she tells him. He looks disgusted "Did Roger send you to me? I knew him to be a lot of things, but not a pimp!" He throws her out, not noticing that she has taken a couple of papers with her.

Vicky is trying to teach David who seems more interested in discussing Roger's accident, and other car accidents. "I always thought that when cars fall down the road they catch fire." Vicky cannot get him back to the math problems she was trying to teach. She tells him to go, and goes back to her room, and begins writing in her notebook. David spies on her through the keyhole.

Barnabas and Willie talk again. Barnabas is now less the frightened, hunted animal. He says that he cannot hide like this forever, that he wants to rejoin human society. "You will need money for that." "I know of a jewel cache, unless someone found it first" "That jewel cache? There is a legend about it, but it is just a legend." "No, I know where it is." He and Willie go to where it was hidden, and Willie has some ideas of how to get a good price for it.

Barnabas mentions that while he is feeding from wildlife, he still needs human blood, but he is afraid that he will kills someone and that he will be hunted down, as before. Willie says that since he did not kill him the first time, he will not kill him now, either and offers him. Barnabas is grateful. Willie says that he should try to feed from people after he has gorged on wildlife so that he will be able to stop in time.

Vicky enters into David's room and accuses him of stealing her notebook. "I wanted to see what you had written about me." "It was nothing to do with you, it was an article I was going to write." "You write? What do you write?" "History" "No, you write about me, so that Father can send me away, but Aunt Liz will not let him" Vicky starts looking into David's drawers and finds her notebook, and next to it, a car part.

She runs to Roger to tell him what she found. Roger sighs. "Yes, of course.. mabye this time Liz will let me do something about him." Liz is adamant. David stays, and Roger has to learn how to be a better father. Vicky suggest having him attend therapy sessions. Liz says no, The child will tell the therapists too many family secrets that need to be kept secret. She looks meaningfully at Roger and at Carolyn as she says that. "At least we know that Burke is innocent" Vicky says.


	5. Malloy's murder

Matthew Morgan, the groundskeeper, berates Willie for slacking at work, saying that he is not as grateful as he should be to Mrs. Stoddard. Willie grumbles that for what Mrs. Stoddard pays him, she is well served. This makes Morgan upset.

"How can you say those horrible thing about this wonderful woman."

"She is just your employer, Matthew, as she is mine. And a stingy one too."

"You are not properly grateful, pup. Who else would give an ex-con a second chance?"

Willie later, talking to Barnabas, mocks Morgan,

"He's carrying a torch for her, and I do not think she even notices her."

"He is a servant and she thinks that that devotion is her due."

Barnabas starts making lists of what he will need if he is to join human society. What he needs to know, and what he can get away with by pretending to be just an eccentric visitor. He knows that he will need clothing, and that he needs to come up with a good story to explain his presence...

"I can be a long lost relative from abroad. And I need to establish some place of abode, an address. I can't hole up in this ruin forever."

"You know, this old ruin could be made habitable. It would take some work.. Maybe you can con the Collinses into refurbishing the place..."

"How could I ask them that?"

"I know how to do it . You offer to restore it, if they allow you to stay here rent free. Then I could come work for you to do it."

"You would?"

"Yeah, it is my dream to one day restore this place and say "I did that."".

Burke plays a visit to Sam Evans, and tells him that he knows that he lied on the stand those years back.

"And you want me to recant, and go to jail for it?"

"There might be no need."

"And even if I did, they all know that I am a drunk, and that alcohol can play tricks on my memory"

"But you wrote about it, didn't you? You worte it down and kept it in a safe place, just in case you needed it again"

Sam sighs. "Let if go, Burke, you are a rich man now. You are probably richer than the Collinses, and you are not stuck in that awful house. You got the best of the deal."

"I had to go to jail for it!"

"Do you know how many people in this town would be glad to go to jail if they knew they would be rich afterwards?"

Vicky goes into the Old House, looking for "artifacts" and is found there by Willie.

"This is not safe, Miss Winters."

"But you come here."

"I know where to step and where to stand. You may fall through a floor. Please go back."

"I came looking for any artifacts thata might have been left..."

"You know that cache of jewels legend is just that, a legend."

"I do not mean those. But old cutlery, some old fabric that has not rotted away, pieces of furniture."

"Old trash?"

"Yes." "

Well, any old trash I find around here, I will bring to you."

"And why are you here?"

"Looking for pieces to restore. I want to get into the restoration business and I need to show some completed pieces."

Bill Malloy, an old friend, comes calling on Liz. He tells her that Burke will not stop asking questions and begs her to tell the truth. He will call on Burke, as he once was his friend and try to make him see reason.

"You mean throw myself at his mercy? Humiliate myself?"

"Liz, you know that I was always your friend, but he is also my friend. This bussiness has to be cleared up."

"It does not need to be cleared up."

Malloy leaves and Liz sobs in dismay.

"How can he say those things to me?"

Then the phone ring and Carolyn picks it up, and then hangs it angrily

"As if we did not have enough, she is coming back."

"Who is she?" Liz asks.

"Laura,who else?. Didn't she do enough damage already? David would not be the mess he is if she hadn't done what she did."

Roger meets Bill Malloy and tells him to stop harassing his sister.

"It is not your sister you worry about but yourself. She has been carrying your secret long enough. Why don't you stop burdening her? Come clean with Devlin. He can be made to see reason."

Roger pushes him away, and when Malloy pushes him back they come to blows, in full view of the town.

Vicky meets with Burke and tells him what happened to Roger, and that David was to blame.

"But they blamed you, and when I pointed out that you were innocent they were upset."

"Yes, they'd love to blame me for everything that goes wrong in their lives."

"Maybe you should try making peace."

"That's what Malloy said to me too."

"Seems like good advice"

"It is not that simple."

On the beach, Malloy lies dead


	6. Malloy's murder II

Sheriff Patterson interrogates Roger about Malloy's death. Elizabeth says that Roger was with her when it happened.

"And when do you think it happened?" Patterson asks sardonically, evidently fed up with the high and mighty owners of the town.

Patterson insists that there were witnesses of the fight between Roger and Malloy, and he is the only suspect up to now. Elizabeth insists on giving Roger an alibi.

"We will wait for the forensic analysis, although, with the body being submerged in high tide, a lot might have washed away"

Patterson interrogates Vicky too, who says that she had been asleep when it happened. Patterson asks if she's seen a key chain with the initals WM, as that characteristic chain is missing. Vicky says that she has not seen any key chain. Patterson warns her about concealing evidence.

Burke and Sam talk again, discussing Malloy's death.

"I KNOW that Roger did it. And I will prove it." Burke insists.

Later as Burke is walking downtown, he sees a woman get down from a taxi and check at the hotel. "Laura!" he calls to her.

Vicky sees a white shape moving near the Old House. She points it out to Carolyn.

"Yeah, that's Josette Collins, our resident ghost. She killed herself, they say - or at least that's what her husband, Jeremiah Collins, said, and everyone believed him. In any case she's been haunting the place. I heard that she is supposed to be our guardian spirity Pretty ineffective one, if you ask me, when you consider what the family has come to."

Willie tells Barnabas that he has to go out of town on an errand for Elizabeth.

"Are you going to be all right when I am gone?"

"I am not completely helpless, you know.'"

"Yeah, but you may get careless."

Burke talks to Laura, and tries to kiss her. She rebuffs him. She is come to ask custody of David, and does not want to give Roger reasons to deny her.

"He would let you have him in a half minute."

"But his sister won't"

Vicky goes to the Old House, taking advantage that Willie is gone and cannot chase her away. She is certain that the Old House is a treasure trove of historical artifacts that Willie cannot recognize as such, and she is going to look for them. She digs into a pile of old junk and something shiny catches her eye. She picks it up, and it is a keychain with the initials WM.

She looks at it, shaken, as it points to Roger, and she remembers Patterson's warning about suppressing evidence.

"But why would Roger hide it here instead of just throwing it into the sea?"

She does not see Matthew Morgan come by.

A maid comes into Laura's room. She sees a shiny jewel on top of the nightstand, and quckly pockets it. She smiles slyly and continues making up the room.

"Give me that! It is mine!" Matthew Morgan says, tearng it up from her hand. "I dropped it here and came back for it."

"Yours?..." Vicky goes pale.

"Mine!"

She backs away frightened.

"No, you want to hurt Mrs. Stoddard, same as that guy. I cannot let you go."

She struggles and screams but he overpowers her and leaves her tied up.

"I will deal with you later"

"Why?"

"He hurt Mrs. Stoddard. I seen her cry after he came by. And I want to know why. I am going to look into his house."

He then gags her and leaves.

Laura returns and sees her jewelry missing. She goes pale, and opens a small case to extract a burning urn.

"Great Ra, a thief took you sigil. Help me retrieve it."

The flame shoots up and we see a small scene of the maid admiring the jewel and showing it to her sister. Laura smiles, and goes out again.

Vicky struggles against her bonds, and crawls on the floor, hoping to find something with a sharp edge. She sees a white figure hovering over her. She almost makes out the features. She feels a sense of peace and falls asleep.

The maid who stole from Laura is walking down the street when she sees Laura

"Give it back!" Laura tells her.

The maid pretends she does not know what she is talking about.

Laura nods. "You are beeing foolish" she says, and walks away.

The maid keeps walking until she stumbles. She is enveloped by flames. The onlookers roll her on the floor and extinshish them. She is taken to the hospital.

Laura watches from a distance. When people have moved away, she goes to the spot and retrieves her jewelry.

Barnabas walks into the Old House, after having fed. The Old House seems empty now that Willie is away. He sees the white figure. "Josette!" he says. He follows her and finds the bound Vicky. He lifs her up, and unties her. She is still sleeping. He has fed. He knows that his hunger will not get out of control. He thinks he can stop in time, so he bites her. Vicky opens her eyes for a moment, and falls asleep again.

Matthew Morgan comes back, having failed to ransack Malloy's place because of the police being there. He mutters that unpleasant as it is, he must kill Vicky now and bury her in the grave he has just dug. He meets Josette who bars his way. Josette rises in front of him, and with her is Bill Malloy. Morgan falls, as Malloy touches him.

Barnabas approaches Morgan, who is now dead. Josette comes close to him, then moves away. He follows her until she disappears "Josette!" he calls "Come back!"

Vicky wakes up, sees the dead Morgan, and runs away.


	7. Laura I

Vicky and Burke have a conversation, with Vicky wanting to convice Burke to give up his bitterness.

"You could be someone I would like to date, but you do nothing but obssess about Roger. I could be obsessing about the fact that I am an orphan and I do not know who my parents are. But I enjoy life and I know that dwelling on the past will not allow me to do it."

"So you find me attractive?"

"You could be."

Laura walks on the outskirts and finds a pile of stones, an old Indian relic. She goes down on her knees

"Oh, Mighty Ra, the time for the sealing of the heir comes closer. Be with me so that your power comes to him"

Willie comes back and Barnabas tells him of what happened, and what he could overhear.

"So Morgan killed Malloy?"

"Yes. As a favor to Mrs. Stoddard." Willie shook his head. "He though the sun came out of her ass, and she never noticed him... poor dumb bastard"

Barnabas says that he is ready to feed on people.

"I can control myself now."

He stalks a girl coming home. He hides in the shadows, and when she comes close he stares into her eyes and puts her in a hypnotic spell. He grabs her and bites. She struggles a bit, but he holds her firm. She goes limp and he checks on her. She is alive, just passed out.

"You will not remember this" he commands her.

The next day the sheriff checks with Dr. David Woodard at the hospital.

"Two sisters, both sent to the hospital in two days. Do not tell me that it is not a coincidence..."

"Their injuries are not the same."

"But they are sisters. Did the new girl tell you anything?"

"She does not remember much. And her injuries are the opposite of her sister's The sister almost burned, but she suffers from exposure and some blood loss. I will run tests on both of them."

Laura meets with Burke.

"Do you want me because you love me, or because you want to hurt Roger?" she asks.

"It is you I want."

Laura stops for a moment, considering him. "Will you help me get custody of David?"

Burke seems reluctant.

"You do not want David because you think that he is Roger's son."

"You mean that he is mine?"

"He could be."

Woodard calls the biochemist Julia Hoffman.

"I got some samples that give me some strange results, and they may be crime lab evidence. I would rather have you test them as you are good at that kind of thing. All that I am really good at is patching up wounded sailors."

Laura goes back to her makeshift altar. She kneels down and hears a snicker behind her. She turns and sees a couple of young men staring at her. She moves away, letting them snicker. After she is gone,a tree bursts into flame, and the sparks reach them. One of them catches fire and the other gets him down and extinguishes the flames.

At a distance, Laura smiles

"Only you can prevent forest fires."

Barnabas goes out again during the night. He attacks anohter girl, and leaves her uncounscious on her doorstep.

Woodard and Patterson talk again.

"That's twice. A fire, and one cold exposure with blood loss. This is a pattern. Cold and fire. Cold is when heat is withdrawn. The heat of the fire in one place is paid by someone getting cold somewhere else."

"This sounds kind of mystical talk."

"Yeah, I know. But you and I know that a pattern is a pattern. Two similar incidents in two days.. We better call an expert on wooo wooo stuff."

"I know someone. Peter Guthrie. He was in medical school, then he branched out into parapsychology. He may remember me."

Burke talks with Roger, who cautions Burke about Laura.

"She is still my wife, you adulterer."

"And you are a murderer and a perjurer."

"I am not..."

"Do you deny that it was you who ran that man down with the car and that you lied on the stand saying that I was the driver?"

"Well, you deserved it for cheating on me with my wife."

"And you paid Sam Evans to perjure himself?'

"Yeah, I did. So what? You will never prove it."

Barnabas talks to Willie. Willie tells him that up to now they tie up his victims with the spontaneous fires happening. Willie tells him that he should not leave his victims lie down on the cold ground, because that way they end up in the hospital, and when it gets colder, they might die. Let them walk away with no memory.

"This has to die down. When you can feed with no problems, with no hospital and no police. When that is settled, you can come in as the long lost relative as we planned. Then we can really fix this place, not just the couple of rooms that I did as a test."

"You want to do it?"

"Refurbishing an old place is a good way to start a career. I do not intend to be a handyman forever. And if helping you makes it possible, so be it."

"And you do not worry that I might hurt someone?'

"Sometimes, but you are getting it right."

In his room, Burke plays back the tape of Roger's confession. He smiles. Roger did not know that he was being taped.

"I got you, Roger Collins!"

He wonders what he will do with it. He could give it to Laura and help her get custody of David. But then that meant that if he and Laura got together, he would have custody of David. Custody of Roger's son, and a disturbed child... But then he could be his own son, an he could get him the therapy he needs... Or he could use it to put pressure on Elizabeth and Roger and make them do as he wants...

Barnabas comes to the diner where Maggie is closing for the night. He comes in. Yes, he has enough control not only to leave her alive, but to leave her in a warm place, with no memory of what happened. Once he can do that, he can be here safely, and the tragedies of the past will not repeat themselves. And it might be that no more penance is to be made by the Collins family. He entrances Maggie and comes closer. As he bites her and tastes her blood, a flood of memories assault him... All those losses... All those people he wll never see again. He pulls back from her, and looks at her... She looks familiar... She IS someone he knows. Someone he knew long ago.

"Josette!"


	8. Laura II

On the way to the Old House Willie sees a little girl playing with a ball.

"It is too late to be out, honey. You better go home."

"I am home"..

"No, seriously, where to you live?"

"Take care of my brother. He has made a mistake and does not realize it."

Willie goes into the Old House and, in a room that he has fixed up, he sees Barnabas bending over an uncosncious Maggie.

"What have you done?"

"Shss... Let her sleep. Let her sleep and remember who she is."

"I know who she is. Maggie Evans."

"She was once Josette... I saw it in her mind when I took her blood. I saw Collinwood as it once was. I saw my mother and father, I saw my family. She IS Josette. And I will help her remember."

Willie begins to protest.

"This is kidnapping. I cannot..."

Barnabas rises quickly and angrily grabs him by the throat.

"I will not lose my chance to have her back because of you complaints. You promised to help me. If you cannot keep your promise, I can force to do it. I WILL have Josette again."

The next day, the big news is of Maggie's disappearance.

"Do you think that it is connected to the fires?" Woodard asks Patterson.

"I think so, but I am going to cover all angles."

Then Peter Guthrie comes in and between Woodard and Patterson they fill him in.

"Yes, a fire, and then later someone who is robbed of heat. It makes sense. Think of a battery. You use it to power things, until the charge is gone. So, it gets recharged. Whoever is doing this is a living battery. Starts the fire, and then recharges."

"And Maggie Evans?"

"Tell me, the victims, what did they remember?"

"The ones burned rambled, as they were in shock. The others, they tell of being touched by cold."

"Whoever did this might worry that his victims might remember. So he takes Maggie Evans, to recharge himself, and makes her disappear so that she cannot tell anything to anyone about it."

Laura talks to David, who is very angry with her for leaving her.

"I do not want you!" he shouts at her. "You abandoned me! You care nothing for me!"

He gets so upset that Vicky interferes and asks Laura to leave the child.

"He is my son. And you are just the hired help, remember"

Willie sees the little girl again.

"Please take care of my brother. He does not know what he is doing."

"Who is your brother?"

"Take care of him. He does not know I am here, so he cannot hear me."

"Who is your brother?"

The girl vanishes, and then Willie hears the chant "London Bridge is falling down"

Laura kneels before the makeshift altar.

"Let my son return to me. Let the lies of his father fall on deaf ears."

She gets up and walks away, and as she leaves, we see Peter Guthrie walking towards the altar.

Vicky is reading the family history, noting the names. She goes pale at what she finds.

David begins to draw. He makes a crude figure which he calls "Mother" and he draws flames around her.

Vicky introduces herself to Peter Guthrie.

"We have a friend in common, Professor Eliot Stokes. He mentioned you as someone with knowledge in "strange things"

"Hardly on Professor Stokes' league. and I think that he mentioned you. Yes, this woman who writes him about historical research."

"What I found can only be explained by "strange things."

"Supernatural, Miss Winters. Do not be afraidn of the word. What did you find?"

"Laura Collins is not the first Laura in this family. There was a Laura married to Edward Collins, who was Roger's grandfather, and a Laura married to Jeremiah Collins, who was the father to Daniel Collins, Edward's great-grandfather. Both Lauras died in fires. And in both fires a daughter of them died in that fire too. Nora Collins in 1897, and Hope Collins in 1785. That is too much coincidence."

"Indeed, Miss Winters. That is too much coincidence. I will look more closely at Mrs, Laura Collins."

At night, Maggie wakes up, but she is in a trance, talking about Collinwood as it was ages ago. Barnabas speaks to her in French, and she answers, but awkwardly. She talks of Mrs. Colllins, Miss Collins, in a more formal tone than Barnabas expects.

He mutters that Maggie Evans' mannerisms still linger in her, but that she will finally remember fully.

Guthrie talks to Burke Devlin, asking him what he knows of Laura. Burke takes it badly.

"I do not know what Roger put you up to, but it will not work."

"Burke, for God's sake. You know better. Do not let your lust blind you. She is not human!"

Burke pushes him away and runs off to meet Laura.

Laura listens calmly

"But you do not believe him, do you?"

"No. I know you. I have had you in my arms. You are no phantom"

They embrace, and Laura smiles slyly.

Peter Guthrie drives to Collinwood, to talk with Roger when his car goes out of control, and it falls off a cliff, killing him.


	9. Laura III

Burke reads the news about Guthrie's death and tries to convince himself that it was an accident. He talks to Laura, who sounds surprised at it.

Maggie wakes up, in a daze, and finds the door to the room where she is in. She is shocked to find the rest of the house in ruins.

"No, this is wrong.. where am I?"

She sees Willie and calls him. "Willie, I am lost. Where am I?"

Willie realizes that she is remembering and that she will want to go home. He is conflicted. He wants to help her, but finds himself reluctant, he is unable to betray Barnabas, due to the bond theyhave. And he may go to jail as an accomplice... and... He urges her to get back to her room and wait for Barnabas. She falls back into her daze, and allows him to lead her back. There he gives her Josette's things.

"You have to remember. He wants you to remember."

David meets Laura and is more cordial towards him. Laura takes him in her arms, and promises to take him away. Forever. Vicky, who remembers what she shared with Gurthrie can barely control her dismay.

"Yes, this means that your services will no longer be required Miss Winters. Do not look so sad, it is only a job."

Willie is working downstairs, mulling over what to do with Maggie. He should take her back to her family. It is wrong what they are doing... But he cannot disobey Barnabas... Maybe he can make him see reason. The song " London Bridge" is heard again. The little girl comes up to him.

"My brother is wrong. You have to tell him that."

"Your brother? Is Barnabas your brother?" "Yes. My big brother Barnabas."

"And you are..."

"Sarah."

"Must I tell him that Maggie is not Josette?"

"Yes. She is not Josette." Willie reckons that if Josette's ghost is hauting Collinwood, then she cannot have been reborn as Maggie.

"I will try to tell him that."

Vicky goes to see Woodard.

"I know that you were a fried of Gurthrie. Did he tell you anything about what he was investigating?"

"Why do you ask?"

"We talked, him and I, and I found something that I shared with him. And I think that David is in grave danger".

Woodard produces a notebook, that Guthrie had left with him.

"It was as if he was afraid that he might not come back, and wanted this kept safe."

Patterson comes in with the news that a little girl has disappeared.

"How old?" Vicky asks.

When Patterson tells her, she races out.

"I know where she is. We may be able to reach there in time."

In the car she explains.

"Before she had a boy and a girl. She sacrificed the girl, and let the boy grow up. She has no daughter this time, so she got another girl for... for the sacrifice. I do not know how or why... Guthrie wrote that she might be a phoenix. And he wrote where the altar is."

Away, at Wyncliffe, Julia Hoffman is runnig tests. Dr. Eric Lang, the head of the instituion comes to see her.

"Still running tests for your friend Woodard?" he asks her.

"They are most interesting"

"Interesting or not, it was not the task I asked of you. We have experiments to run."

Julia makes a gesture of disgust.

"Miss Hoffman, before you get hight and mighty, remember that you have your own ethical lapses and I have proof of them"

Julia sighs and drops what she is doing. She follows Lang, giving him a look of hatred behind his back.

Laura stands at the altar, with David at her side, and the little girl lies on the stones. Laura speaks to David

"You see, you are a phoenix and inherit the power of the phoenix. You have accumulated the power of thsoe who came before you, your ancestors who mingled their blood with mine. But your power must be transmitted through this sacrifice. And maybe this time the power will not lie dormant in you,, but you will truly rise again."

The girl whimpers, but Laura pays no attention.

"There is no sister to give her life to you this time... It was too painful to me to raise a daughter only to sacrifice her... this way is better. Stand back, David, let me do, and watch. Receive the power."

Vicky, Patterson, and Woodard reach the altar in time. Patterson commands Laura to stop, Vicky reaches out to David, pulling him to her, while Woodard picks up the girl. Patterson tells Laura to give herself up.

"You meddling fools" Laura says, reaching for a torch. "You are nothing to me."

She sets herself on fire, and stands impassible, as the flames consume her.

"Was she insane?" Patterson asks.

"Or a real phoenix, as Guthrie said." Woodard mutters.

At the Old House Barnabas rises. He goes to see Maggie who backs away from him, scared.

"What's wrong, Josette?"

"She is not Josette, Barnabas. She is not!" Willie shouts. Barnabas grabs him and throws him on the floor.

"She is! How dare you say those things?"

He goes after Maggie who screams and kicks.

"She ain't Josette! Sarah told me so! Sarah told me you made a mistake.!"

"Sarah.." Barnabas stops for a moment, but reaches back for Maggie, catching her wrists.

"I do not want to hurt you, but you are fighting me. I have to make you see reason."

He shakes her, and as she does, she hits her head on the wall and faints.

Barnabas bends over her, his fangs bared, and then the song 'London Bridge" is heard and he is hit by a rubber ball. He turns around, surprised.

In the ground, Maggie starts dreaming... or rememering... and we are suddenly transported to 1786..


	10. Barnabas' origin I

1785.

Barnabas is embracing his mistress, Angelique. He says that in spite of what his father or his uncle Jeremiah wants, he will marry her. The problem is his mother whose health is fragile, and who may not bear the possibility of scandal in the family. Angelique says that she understands, but we catch a glimpse of desperation in her eyes.

Naomi and Abigail are preparing the house to receive Jeremiah and her new wife, Josette. Naomi laments that Jeremiah is marrying so soon after the deaths of his wife and daughter. Abigail mutters that those deaths were God's punishment for harboring an enemy of religion.

"What do you mean?"

"That Papist that you hired to teach the children"

"Phyllis Wick is a good woman, and a good governess."

"She is a Papist, and brings pestilence where she goes." "Just remember that Jeremiah's new wife is also a Catholic."

"More wickedness under this roof."

Nathan Forbes is courting Millicent Collins who is beguiled by his words.

"I wish I could believe that your beautiful words are true."

"Believe it, Millicent."

Joshua comes by.

"She is not the great heiress you think she is. She may get SOME money, but if I was chasing fortunes I would look somewhere else."

"Sir, I truly love your niece, and money does not enter in my considerations."

"In marriage, money always enters into consideration. Never trust a man who denies it."

Angelique is alone, and we see a figure form in her mirror. It is Nicholas Blair who smiles at her.

"You know of the price."

"He will marry me."

"Men are fickle and another woman may cross his path. "

"He is not! He loves me."

Nicholas smiles "Ah, you water nymphs, always ready to fall in love with a mortal man, and to gain an immortal soul. And always failing."

"He will marry me!"

Phyllis Wick is weeping silently in a corner, as Barnabas passes by.

"Was Aunt Abigail unkind to you again?"

"She... she took my rosary. Tore it from me, saying that she would not have idolatry in this house!"

"I will see that she gives it back."

Joshua and Abigail have a spat.

"You can go to your backwoods preacher all you like, and spend hours on your knees praying but you will not insult Jeremiah's wife! Not if you want to keep a roof over your head!"

"He would not dare!"

"He would if you provoke him."

"He has no right!"

"By our Father's will, he has the right, as he has that of throwing me out, along with my wife and children. So, be pleasant to Josette when she comes."

Angelique is weeping, trying to tell herself that Nicholas is wrong, that Barnabas loves her. She takes out the potion that he uses to make her love him.

"So little left...And when it is gone, so will his love. Why can't he love me for myself?"

"Daughter!"

She turns to see the Spirit of the River, who looks at her with sad eyes.

"Father!" she runs to him.

"My daughter. I see you going to your ruin, and cannot help you."

"He loves me! He will love me!"

"If he does not, if he brings you harm, he will be punished."

He gives her a glass globe. "There is revenge there, my daughter. It will not change your fate, but you will know that thosee who did this to you will suffer for it."

Daniel and Sarah are playing under the eyes of Phyllis Wick. She has her rosary back, and begins praying.

"You should not do that, Miss Wick. Miss Abigail will see you. She has eyes on the back of her head." Ben Stokes says to her.

"You are right." Phyllips puts it away. "I heard that Mr. Joshua emanciapated you, that you are a free man."

"No, not free yet. I am an indentured servant." He sighs, a bit cynical. "It is not well seen to own slaves, even if you buy and sell them oversees. But he is not willing to part with my labor, nor pay me wages, so I am an indentured servant."

"Indentures run out. My own grandparents were indentured servants. And before that, we were slaves. Our family was sold into slavery by Cromwell, cursed be his name, when he invaded Ireland. We were slaves, then, after a while indentured servants, and now I am a free woman. As free as a woman with no money can be. Maybe my children, if I have them will be better off."

"Maybe I can be really free if Mr. Barnabas convinces Mr. Joshua to let me go..."

"Really, Barnabas, I have put up with your nonsense long enough!" Joshua shouts at his son. "What is it this time? Encourage your friend Forbes to court Cousin Millicent? Release Ben Stokes from his bond and pay him wages, as if he were a white man? Marry your blonde strumpet? And let's not talk about all the abolinionst literature you bring in. Have you forgotten that the slave trade is our bread and butter? Do you think that Jeremiah will put up with more of your nonsense? I will not be turned out of this house because my son has no sense in his stupid head."

"Father!"

" I don't want to listen to your speeches. I do not want to know about how Forbes is a brave gallant officer who fought for our country. I do not want to know what a stalwart fellow Ben Stokes is! And I do not want to know about your strumpet! Bed her if you wish, but you will NOT marry her. Not unless you want to kill your mother."

"You refuse to listen to reason!"

"It is you who refuse to listen! This is not your house. This is Jeremiah's house, and we live by his rules... And when he comes back, you will be pleasant to his wife, and make no snide comments about the slaves in her plantation. It is no concern of yours!"


	11. Barnabas' origin II

Jeremiah Collins returns to Collinwood with his new wife, Josette. He introduces her to her family who welcomes her, except Abigail who mutters about the Whore of Babylon entering by the main door. Barnabas is civil, but cool. On being introduced to her, Daniel screams.

"You are not my mother! I hate you!"

Phyllis Wick drags him away "Forgive him, He misses his mother very much."

Josette smiles at her, and notes the crucifix around her neck.

Nathan and Millicent make plans to elope to the next judge, as Barnabas has told them to do, because given the opposition of Joshua and Jeremiah, it will be easier to get forgiveness than permission.

Abigail attents a gathering of Reverend Trask's congregation, where she decries the fact that a Papist has become the mistress of Collinwood

"We must stop this abomination."

Jeremiah explodes when told of Millicent's elopement. He berates Barnabas, telling him that, were it not for the affection he feels for Joshua, Naomi, and Sarah, he would turn them all out of his house.

"I advice you to move away, dear nephew. You have been a thorn on my side for too long."

Angelique weeps, waiting for Barnabas to return. He comes in later and later, pleading family troubles. She recalls Nicholas' taunts. She sees in a corner the orb that his father has given her. The orb that will pay back for the suffering they inflict on her.

"I am a spirit of the water." she tells herself. "Water is as soft and pliable as anything, so I have been soft and pliable for Barnabas. But water is not to be challenged. They know how many lives water takes when the tempest come. We water spirits drown sailors and other males who are not wary of our power. I have drowned many. Let Barnabas be untrue, and I will be a tempest with him and drown him in giant waves."

She takes the orb again, ready to smash it.

"But not yet. He may return to me and be loving again. And again I will be soft and pliable in his arms."

Jeremiah talks to Nathan Forbes.

"You know that Millicent does not have much money. Yes, she will get a share, and between that and your wages, you might live comfortably. But I can increase your share."

"And what do I have to do for it?"

"You are a man after my own heart. You go straight to the point. Well, you know that plan you and my stupid nephew had about distilling sugar from maple syrup to replace the sugar we buy from the Caribbean?"

"Yes."

"I want you to sabotage it. Make sure it goes nowhere."

"And why would you do that?"

"Because the Caribbean plantations are our main customers. If they lose business, they will not buy as many slaves from me. I know, my stupid nephew has his head full of the theories of the Manumission Society, and also the economic theories of that Hamilton, about how we have to produce what we need here instead of buying from abroad. Well, let him have his pretty theories. But never let him threaten our livelihood."

Forbes agrees. He sees Ben Stokes nearby and calls him.

"You have heard, haven't you?" he asks.

Ben Stokes shakes his head, scared.

"Never mind. Just because on paper you are not a slave, does not mean that you cannot be whipped. So be very careful of what tales you spread out there."

Daniel has is tearing up a dress of Josette's when she is discoverd by Phyllis Wick, who berates him. Josette comes, and is upset. She tries to talk to

Daniel and tries to befriend him, but he rebuffs her

"You are not my mother!" They are distracted by an uproar outside. They come out and see a bonfire, and on the bonfire, a crude statue that, with its blue mantle and crown, both Josette and Phyllis recognize as the Virgin Mary.

"No Popery!" they hear people chant, and they recognize Abigail, and behind her, Reverend Trask.

Jeremiah races to confront the congregation, while Josette breaks down and cries. Barnabas, who has been cool to her up to now, sees her distress and comforts her.

Naomi and Joshua talk about Barnabas.

"It might be better if he went away." Joshua said. "He does nothing but irritate Jeremiah."

"You know, I never liked the idea of his marrying that strumpet, but I would rather have him married and settled than..."

"Than what?"

"Than getting friendly with his uncle's wife."

"Naomi! how can you say that..."

"She is young, much younger than Jeremiah, but Barnabas is about her own age. Put them together and anything can happen. Better than he be married and away."

"But you do not think that Josette would be capable of adultery, nor Barnabas."

"I do not know what to think. I just do not like it."

Barnabas and Josette talk again, she thanking him for befriending her. She talks about her early life in Paris, and how, after her parents died broke, her aunt had taken her to Martinique to stay with a relative, and how she was then traded as a bride to cement a business deal.

"I am basically an expensive slave, better treated than the ones at the plantation, certainly."

She tells about the horrors of the plantation that left her sick, and her inability to help.

"I guess that my attitude to the way they live made them quite willing to give me away in marriage as I was... and I was glad to get out of that Hell."

Barnabas tells of the Manumission society, and how there are no slaves in Massachussets - though a lot of indentured servants. "I hope that you will find this place more congenial"

He touches her arm, and it is as if a spark has come between them.

Note: Until 1820 there was no State of Maine. It was part of Massachussets.

Note: In


	12. Barnabas' origin III

Naomi talks to Barnabas. She talks about her weak heart, and that she may die soon. She tells him that she is worried that he would be forced out, and that she would die without seeing him again.

Barnabas promises to behave.

She asks him to marry Angelique, and stop being so friendly with Josette "people will talk" she warns him.

He tries to protest, but as he does so, she gasps for breath and says "I want to see my children before I die."

Phyllis Wick encourages Ben to ask her in marriage.

He worries that his being indentured might put him beneath her. She dismisses it.

"I come from slaves and indentured servants. I have no false pride."

He wonders if she really loves him.

She says that she is fond of him, and respects him.

Millicent and Nathan come visit the family.

Nathan reassures her that the family will welcome them "Mr. Collins was very accommodating."

Millicent talks about Josette. She is curious about this foreign woman.

"She is very young. Too young"

"What do you mean?"

"Closer in age to Barnabas. I smell trouble in the making there."

Barnabas joins Sarah in her lessons.

Phyllis Wick tells him that he wants to marry Ben Stokes.

He tells her that he will ask again his father to release Ben from his indenture.

"That would make a nice wedding gift"

She tells him that Josette comes every now and then to check on Daniel, trying to soften him.

"If she comes here, I will say that you met here with me, and your conversation was about the children and their studies. That nothing improper happened."

He starts to protest.

"You do not want to be alone with her."

"That's not as easy when we live in the same house."

"You can always have me or Ben around, as witnesses." She warns him that people are whispering.

"But it is not true."

"Rumors do not have to be true to be believed. I have seen it in other places. You have always been kind to me, and I would hate to see you suffer for it."

Abigail comes to thank Naomi for interceding for her with Jeremiah so that she was not sent away.

"Instead of thanking me, you should change your ways. Stop going to Reverend Trask's congregation. Join Joshua at me at our chapel."

"I will do what is pleasing to the Lord."

"Abigail, remember what Jeremiah said. One more incident and you will be gone. And be pleasant to Josette. She is the mistress of Collinwood now."

"Not for long. For she is an adulteress."

"She is not!"

"And you cover it up because it is your son."

"You are one spreading the rumors, are you?"

"I tell the truth."

Barnabas and Nathan talk about their sugar extracting business.

Nathan tell him of setbacks with the machinery. "It broke, because they used it wrong. I fired the one running it, and sent it to be fixed. That will delay us for a few days."

Barnabas wonders why there are so many accidents.

Angelique walks the grounds of Collinwood and she comes across Abigail.

"So, the strumpet comes to see if she can enter through the front door." Abigail sneers at her.

Angelique tries to placate her, but Abigail exults. "You will be going away soon. Barnabas found someone better. It is adultery, of course, and he will be punished for it. Him and that Papist whore my brother married."

Angelique is shattered and runs away, while Abigail laughs at her.

Josette and Barnabas find themselves alone.

Barnabas remembers the warnings and tries to move away.

"No, don't go!" Josette pleads "You are my friend, my best friend. If you turn away from me I have nothing."

"Alas, I may be more than friend."

Josette looks at him. "I want you to be more than friend." she confesses. "I know I should not...but"

Impulsively, he takes her into his arms and kisses her.

She responds for a few seconds, then pushes him away. "We must not.."

"No, we must not." He agrees.

Angelique paces her room.

Inside the mirror, Nicholas sneers. "You did not win his love, my beautiful sprite. By our agreement you are now my slave." "Please, I can win him back."

"You have lost. You gambled and lost, and you must pay what you owe."

"Please..."

"I will grant you a day, so that you can try and fail again. Then I will come collect him"

Jeremiah berates Abigail, reminding her to be polite to his wife.

"Your Papist wife" she sneers.

"My wife."

"Your wife and Barnabas' mistress."

"What do you mean?"

"You think I have no eyes? They all know, except you."

Barnabas returns to Angelique, troubled. He should marry her, he knows. Or send her away. He knows that he does not love her. And yet he owes her something.

He walks in and sees her standing in the middle of the room, with the orb above her head. "

You should not have done it." she says. "You should not have mocked me, for you mock the Spirit of Water and its power. I will go into slavery now, but you will suffer for it."

She throws the orb to the ground, and it shatters. Smoke rises from the shattered orb and a figure forms. A black man with markings on his face and chest.

"I am Olajuwon, a spirit of revenge. I was summoned by dying slaves in Collins ships, and I will bring punishment on all of you."

Note: I had the chance to see the Opera "Rusalka" with Renee Fleming. The theme is that of a water sprite that loves a mortal man, is betrayed by him, and loses everything, while he dies. Renee Fleming looks a lot like Lara Parker, and the last scene had her in a white gown, walking away from her dying lover, amid the fog... Pure DS... So, of course, I had to use it...


	13. Barnabas' origin IV

Barnabas stares stunned at Olajuwon, who lifts his hand and strikes him.

He falls down and Olajuwon towers over him.

"You shall be the instrument of vengeance. You and your family has fed off countless human beings. Thus you will feed on human beings, you will feast on their blood, and enslave them. White people will learn slavery from you. And you will rain destruction on your family. You will watch them die as the slaves saw their loved ones die or be taken away. You shall face the truth about yourself, and the truth will bring death and suffering. Everyone you love will die, and you shall be the instrument of their deaths. Sleep now, and when you awake at dusk, you will feel the hunger and the rage. So will the slaves' curse be fulfilled."

Abigail talks with Daniel

"You do not want Josette here, do you, my child?"

"I hate her."

"We can send her away."

"How?"

"All you have to do is tell Jeremiah that you saw her kiss Barnabas."

Joshua and Naomi wonder where Barnabas might be, since no one has seen him since he went to see Angelique. Angelique seems to be gone, too.

"I am sure that he will be back later, but it is not like him to disappear like this."

Later, at night, Barnabas appear to Ben Stokes, with blood dripping down his chin.

"Ben... help me."

He tells him that he woke up inside a coffin in the caves, and he had this terrible hunger and this fury that drove him to destroy.

He ran across a woman, that he attacked and drank her blood.

"Did you kill her?"

"No. I can feel her in my mind. She is alive, and she is enslaved to me. I command her, and so it will be with all I shall feed upon."

Ben says that he has heard of such as he, that he is dead, and a vampire now.

"Ben, I have this terrible urge to get into my family and tear them apart. It is not blood I seek from them, but their suffering. You, as a black man and a slave should be spared this vengeance, but anyone else...I am a weapon of destruction, because of slaves's curses."

He asks Ben to stake him, telling him where his coffin is.

"I will not destroy my family, as that spirit commands me."

Daniel tells his father that he saw Barnabas kiss Josette. Jeremiah erupts with fury.

"They played me for a fool" He tells Joshua that if Barnabas sets foot in Collinwood, he will kill him.

Reverend Trask meets with Abigail, who tells him that "the Papist whore" will be expelled, sent back in disgrace. Trask commends her, telling her to be more vigilant.

"And get rid of that other Papist, the Wick woman. We cannot allow their ilk to set food in this sacred ground."

Nathan Forbes is adding up what he knows of the Collins fortune. If he stays in Jeremiah's good graces, he could have Millicent's portion increased. At Barnabas' expsense? Very likely. There were plenty of rumors about Barnabas and Jeremiah's young wife. Barnabas might find himself disinherited quite soon, and who better than Millicent and his husband, that gallant officer, to be granted that portion? He is interrupted by the appearance of Suki, who announces herself as a relative.

"Yes, a relative" Nathan says, grimly amused.

Ben Stokes goes with a stake to put Barnabas out of his misery. But as he lifts the lid he sees Olajuwon who accuses him of betraying his people. He reminds Ben of the conditions of the ship were the slaves are carried, and the life in the plantations, where they are worked to death.

"You owe to your people that those who brought so much misery be punished."

Nathan gives Suki the money he carries, but promises that there will be more if she keeps quiet about her being his wife. "The money is Millicent's. If I am proven to be a bigamist, I will lose all of it. You do not want to kill the goose that lays the golden egg."

Barnabas rises, upset that Ben has not done as he asks.

He grabs him by the throat, but there is no real fury in him. He lets Ben go, and mutters that he cannot cheat the curse. He could not stay up until sunrise, either...

He walks on the grounds of Collinwood, feeling his fury rise. He knows that it is not himself, but Olajuwon, yet he cannot stop himself. He should go away, not come closer, but he is drawn to it. He hears screams. Josette's screams. He follows them, and he watches Jeremiah beating Josette, accusing her of adultery.

He burst in, catches Jeremiah, and tears him apart, feasting on his blood.

All splattered in blood, he seeksJosette who runs away, horrified.

He follows her, trying to explain, but she does not listen. She races to Widow's Hill, and falls to her death.


	14. Barnabas' origin V

Barnabas paces desolately over Widow's Hill, relieving the death of Josette.

"There is more to come." Olajuwon says to him. "All shall suffer for the evil they committed."

"She was innocent!" Barnabas protests

"She profited from the crime, she lived off the pain and suffering of slaves." "

She hated it."

"But she did nothing, so now, she will watch, as a spirit, over the Collins family, trying to protect them and failing to."

"Have you no mercy?"

"I am a spirit of revenge, mercy is not in my nature."

Nathan Forbes wonders about Jeremiah's will. Was it true that he had disinherited Barnabas, as he kept threatening? On the other hand, if Barnabas has disappeared, then he would be declared dead... And what would happen to Barnabas' portion then? Will it be transferred to Sarah? Or Daniel? He mus make sure that some of it goes to Millicent.

Barnabas is pulled by his hunger to the docks. There he meets Ruby Tate. He talks to her, resigned to having to bite her to sustain himself, but the expression of his face scares her. He tries to grab her, and he slips and falls into the water, where she drowns.

The next morning Ben Stokes meets with Reverend Trask who berates him for marrying a Catholic.

Ben makes disparaging comments about a church that allows men women and children to be kidnapped and sold as slaves. Trask responds that slavery is God ordained, and that Stokes should be glad that his parents were kidnapped and taught the true faith.

"They were saved from the evils of idolatry. Their souls have been saved."

Behind Stokes, Olajuwon watches, and smiles grimly.

Barnabas rises again, wondering if this is what his existence will be, a never ending trail of death. He sees Olajuwon by his coffin.

"How long will this go on?"

"Until full payment is made."

"I cannot.."

"You will. And I will show you where to direct your wrath."

He makes appear a scene of Trask talking to Abigail.

"You did well, Miss Collins"

"Jeremiah had to see what a viper he had taken to his boson. Daniel did tell his father about her adultery with Barnabas. Even if Daniel had not seen them kissing, it was no lie, because they were both adulterers."

Barnabas is shaken by the revelation of his aunt's treachery.

"You must punish them, both of them." Olajuwon tells him.

Phyllis Wick is considering leaving Collinwood, but Joshua asks her to stay, saying that he will protect her.

She says that she is being blamed for Jeremiah's death.

"Nonsense!"

"I am Catholic, that's guilt enough."

Barnabas appears to Abigail, who asks him where he has been all this time.

"Your father and mother are worried about you."

"And you are not?"

"Of course, I am."

"Or did you find it easier to accuse me and Josette when I was not around to defend myself?"

"I know what you did."

He grabs her. "You lied! And because you lied Josette is dead! Because of your filthy lies! You and that preacher Trask!"

Scared, she screams.

He bares his fangs, and tears into her, with fury.

He tears her apart, like he did to Jeremiah. He drops her body.

"Now it is time for that preacher".

In Collinwood Sarah gets up from bed.

"Barnabas is here!" she says. "He is back!"

She goes to the door, only to be stopped by Phyllis Wick.

"There is no one, Sarah. No one. And you must not go out. It is very dangerous out there."

Olajuwon appears to Barnabas.

"Their deaths were too quick, too merciful. You must make them suffer. That preacher who says that the slave trade is righteous because it makes the slaves know Christ, he must be made to suffer. You must do this to him."

The next day, Nathan Forbes tells Suki that while he is short of money, he found a cache of jewels, and that she can have her share if she helps him dig them out.

Suki goes with him, but when they get to the water's edge, Nathan hits her on the back of the head, and throws her down into the rocks.

"Another victim of the mysterious killer who is terrorizing us" he says.

Barnabas gets Ben to prepare the materials for the walling up of Trask.

Ben begins to protest, but Barnabas silences him.

"You must obey, just as I must. This is Justice. This is Payment."

Ben asks him if it was him that killed Abigail. "Yes. She was responsible for the death of Josette".

"How about the woman that drowned, Ruby Tate?"

"That was an accident. If she had not panicked, I would have fed and released her. Olajuwon does not desire their deaths but their enslavement."

"And you obey him?"

"I must."

"When will this end?"

"I do not know."


	15. Barnabas' origin VI

Trask is in his study when a voice summons him

"Reverend! Reverend! come quickly"

He goes outside

"Who are you?"

"Come quickly"

He steps out and is grabbed by Barnabas.

"Time for your trial, Trask" Olajuwon says.

Nathan talks to Joshua about Jeremiah's will. He asks if Jeremiah did disinherit Barnabas as he always threatened to do. "But with him disappeared, we can presume him dead."

He asks if his portion, as that of Abigail will be distributed among the remaining heirs.

His attitude shocks Joshua. "My son was a fool to trust you. I knew you for the fortune hunter you are."

Naomi teneds to Sarah, who is agitated and says that she has seen Barnabas.

"But why isn't he coming back? Why is he hiding?"

Naomi is visibly distressed, and at some point clutches at her heart. Phyllis Wick bring her her medicine.

"I wish my heart was not so weak". Naomi says.

Trask is chained in a ruined chapel. Olajuwon is trying him for saying that the slave trade is a blessing for it allows black idolaters to know Christ.

"So you think that men women and children chained in the dark, slowly dying is a good thing. "

"There is nothing worth more than knowing Jesus Christ.

" Olajuwon calls on the spirits of those who died in the slave ships, who describe their deaths

"And I did not know Jesus Christ, all I know that he ordered my suffering."

Olajuwon decrees that Trask, for telling the slave traders that their work was godly ordained should die chained in the dark. Barnabas grimly walls him up.

Sarah spies Barnabas from her window, and this time she manages to slip out of the house. She races on the ground calling for him.

She slips and drops in a pond. She screams and asks for help. Ben Stokes pulls her out and brings her back in.

"Barnabas is here!" she insists.

Later, the next day Nathan notes that now Trask is missing.

"Another victim of our mysterious killer" he says. He tells Millicent that Barnabas was probably killed by the same criminal. If not, he would come back

"Of course, he might be the killer himself" he mutters to himself. If Barnabas should come back, and not be disinherited after all, there might be a chance to charge him with the killings. Once executed, his portion will end up with the remaining heirs.


	16. Note

Note:

I made several changes in the 1785 storyline for a) artistic reasons and b) historical reasons.

I am a history buff, and I *groaned* really *groaned* at the original version of that period. The worst was when they sent Josette to buy her trousseau in Paris in ***1794*** Right into the Reign of Terror. Short trip to the guillotine for an aristocrat like her.

So:

No charges of witchcraft. That was one hundred years before. On the other hand, there was strong prejudice against Catholics at that time. Made perfect sense for Trask and Abigail to try to get rid of "Papists".

The slave trade was very much an issue. Does anyone wonder what "business deals" the Collins family had in Martinique? There were sugar plantations there, and they always needed labor, as they tended to die off due to the horrible conditions there. Alas, the marriage of Josette was part of the deal to provide fresh meat to the du Pres family.

Of course, if the Collinses were slave traders, it makes sense that any curse coming down to them has to do with that (in the original there was talk that the family was cursed for its participation in the slave trade, but in the late sixties, with the Civil Rights struggle, to talk about it was to dig into freshly reopened wounds, and to bring reality into what was supposed to be an escape. So they had to bring in Angelique, and the final Diabolos ex Machina, Judah Zachary. I think that I am bringing back the original concept)

Barnabas- Jeremiah- Josette: When Barnabas was first introduced, the impression was that he and Josette had an affair while she was Jeremiah's wife. Then they changed it when they did the flashback. But let's go back to the original concept. If Jeremiah is much older than Josette, and Barnabas near her age, then you have a classical story: that of Francesca di Rimini and Paolo, or that of Pelleas and Melisande, which have inspired writers, painters and musicians. That was a good artistic reason to adopt it.

As for Jeremiah being the older brother, and Joshua the younger, this would explain why no one wondered why Barnabas went away "to England". The only son and heir of the family fortune cannot just disappear with no explanation. But the son of the junior branch, who is in conflict with the family head can and will move away and no one will wonder.

Also I made Ben Stokes black. There were no slaves in Massachussets (and at that time, there was no Maine, it was all Massachussets), but a lot of former owners held on to their slaves by making them indentured servants. In any case, making Ben Stokes black allows me to have him, and his descendant, Eliot Stokes, played by Morgan Freeman.

And the first slaves in America were not blacks, but Irish. So, since Obama has Irish ancestry, he has slaves in his family tree.

As for Laura, since she is the mother of Jamison Collins and of David Collins, it would not be much of a stretch to make her the mother of Daniel, and keep the pattern.


	17. Barnabas' origin VII

Barnabas hears from Ben what happened to Sarah, who is now sick with pneumonia.

"It is Olajuwon's doing"

"But she is a child, and innocent."

"He would tell me that in the slave ships many innocent children died. We are made to pay for all that suffering."

Nathan comes to enquire about Sarah's health. When told that she is suffering from pneumonia, he can barely disguise his pleasure. With Sarah dead and Barnabas disappeared, the junior branch is extinguished. The heirs are now Daniel and Millicent. If anything were to happen to Daniel...

Barnabas appears before Joshua. He literally appears before his eyes, to convince him that he is not lying.

"Are you a ghost?"

"You may call me that."

He tell him of Olajuwon, and how it is punishing the family, destroying them one by one.

"Is there no way to placate him?"

"Not while we trade in slaves. You need to make amends. Release the slaves you have now. Stop the trade. Trade other commodities. Work towards the abolition of slavery. If you do that, whatever remains may be spared."

He vanishes, and leaves Joshua in despair.

Naomi has fallen asleep at Sarah's bedside, Her heart is beating irregularly and she breathes with difficulty. Barnabas appears and beds towards Sarah. She wakes and recognizes him.

"Barnabas, you are back!"

Barnabas sees how close she is to death and sobs. A noise behind him tells him that Naomi is waking. He vanishes, but not before she sees him.

Seeing him vanish is too much of a shock to her, and she falls dead.

The next day, Sarah is near death.

Only Joshua and Daniel remain. Jeremiah's will is moot. Except for what Millicent might be given, Daniel will get all.

Then he gets up, startled.

"Where is Daniel?" he asks.

He rushes out looking for him. So do Ben and Phyllis Wick. Ben gives Phyllis a gun and takes one for himself.

"You might need it."

They all race in different directions, but it is Phyllis who comes upon Nathan as he is trying to strangle Daniel. Phyllis shoots Nathan dead.

At night, Barnabas goes to Sarah's deathbed, grimly aware that nothing can save his sister now. Whatever amends are made will not help her. They might help Daniel and his descendant, but it is too late for the rest of them.

He feels that he is summoned by Olajuwon and cannot fight the summons. He finds himself drawn into his coffin, and as he lies down on it, and the lid closes, he hears chains locking him in.

"Chained in darkness for no one knows how long. This is your punishment"

Joshua gets the authorities to release Phyllis Wick, as she was doing his bidding, and she saved Daniel from being murdered.

"Greed made Lieutenant Forbes a killer. When he realized that only Daniel's life kept him from being the sole heir of the Collins fortune, he decided to remove that last obstacle."

This is an argument that the authorities undestand, and Phyllis is not charged. But as she is released, she is set up by enraged members of the Trask congretation who blame her for his disappearance and they lynch her.

...

In the present, Maggie wakes up and looks at Baranbas. "I remember... I remember now... I was Phyllis Wick."


	18. Back to the present

Barnabas stares dumbounded at Maggie.

Sarah appears to him "Why are you hurting my governess?" she asks him.

Barnabas looks at Maggie again, as memories flood him. "So, this is what happened."

Maggie looks at him "You were kind to me. You protected me from Abigail and all the others. You were my friend then. I was a servant, with no one to help me, but you did."

Barnabas falls on his knees and begins to weep. "They are all dead, all gone..I did not dream it... I lost them all..."

Willie gets up and puts his hand on Barnabas' shoulder.

Sarah comes to him, "You were confused, Barnabas. You were wrong."

Barnabas looks at Sarah. "Please stay with me." "I

cannot. But I will always love you. And if you need me I will come."

Willie, Maggie, and Barnabas hug each other until Barnabas stops sobbing.

"Yes, when I touched you mind with the bite, I got all those memories. And I thought that you were Josette."

Maggie laughs. "To think that you mistook a lowly governess for a French aristocrat."

Maggie will go back to his family now, and say she does not remember anything. Since no one else remembers being attacked by Barnabas, she will be believed..

She asks him what are his plans. He says that he wants to introduce himself to the family and renovate the Old House.

"You are going to need money."

"I have a cache of jewels."

"They will not last forever. You will need another source of income. Let me think about it."

Burke Devlin calls on Vicky. He asks her what was the deal with Laura. She tells him.

"I have been a fool" he says "I should have known better. This is the kind of thing I am supposed to know."

"Why should you?"

"Because it is my job."

"But your business..." "

The business is a front. Yes, it makes money, but I do not run it. I am the figurehead, and it allows me to travel to any trouble spots and solve them."

"Are you a spy?"

"An investigator for supernatural occurrences. They recruited me when they released me from jail."

"So..."

"So I should have KNOWN what Laura was, but I was so caught up in my old issues with Roger that I did not see what was obvious."

He pulls out the tape with Roger's confession. "Give this to Roger. Tell him that it is the only one, and that he can burn it."

"And what will you do?"

"I will go and explain to my bosses what happened here. Maybe I will be lucky and they will not fire me."

Barnabas makes plans with Willie as to how to approach the family.

"Is there a family?" he asks.

"Yes, there is."

"And is Olajuwon here?"

"I would not know. But you could find out. Vicky is an amaterur historian and has been looking into the family - which she has not shared with Elizabeth or Roger because they might not like it. You could ask her."

"And I have bitten her before, so I can summon her."

Maggie purposely staggers to the Blue Whale, and makes a show of fainting as she enters. When roused she asks

"Where am I?"

She pretends she does not remember anything since she disappears. She only felt cold...

Barnabas summons Vicky and bites her again.

He asks her of any mention of Olajuwon, or family curses, or slavery.

Vicky says that Joshua stopped the family slave trade, and he supported abolitionism, as did Daniel.

So did Daniel's children, all three of them, Quentin, Morgan, and Gabriel.

Quentin and Morgan died in the Civil War, and only Gabriel, who was cripple and thus could not fight remained.

Quentin and Morgan died childless, so the current family descends from Gabriel

"Two sons who died to free the slaves" Barnabas mused. "Maybe that was payment enough for Olajuwon. Or..."

"Gabriel and his children continued their support for black freedom and citizenship. So did their grandchildren. Roger joined the Civil Rights struggle and went South to register voters - and returned married to Laura... And Carolyn... she did something there, but they do not talk about it. Seems that she went over the line."

"So payment is still made to Olajuwon, one way or another, and thus the family is allowed to continue."

Vicky realizes that he IS the original Barnabas Collins, and that he has lived over two hundred years ago.

"I told you what you wanted. I will want you to tell me of your life back then. I want to know more about that period."

The next day Woodard comes to tell Vicky that now Maggie has reappeared, something that he attributes to Laura's being destroyed.

"Evidenlty she used Maggie as a source of energy. She does not remember much, same as before. Well, it is over."

He notices that Vicky is very pale and seems tired.

'You did not sleep well?" he asks, concerned.

"I kept thinking of what would have happened if we had not gotten to Laura on time."

"Yes," he agrees. "When you have to act, you act, but then you are hit by the enormity of it. But if it does not get better, come to me and I will give you something for it."


	19. David v Barnabas I

Barnabas contacts Elizabeth, and proposes to renovate the Old House.

Elizabeth is reluctant, but he manages to hypnotize her, and realizes that her objection is to have him "interfere with their lives" or "look into our secrets".

He reassures her that he will only come over to their home if invited, that he will be happy camping out in the Old House until it is restored

"It is not the first time that I had to rough it, and it has certain attractions"

Once Elizabeth realizes that her secrets will be safe, she lets him stay, rent free until the place is livable again, and then they will renegotiate.

Maggie has recovered enough, even though Sam insists that she stay in bed. She grumbles that they need money, and that she thinks that there is a money making idea somewhere, but she needs to figure out how.

Joe comes to visit, and she confides in him, certain that the possibility of money will let him overlook certain things.

"Now it is my turn to tell you that it is dangerous"

"Not half as dangerous as the company you keep"

Julia Hoffman arrives at Woodard's office, asking him for more samples

"I think that the problem was solved."

"Dave, we know that for every virulent case of a disease there are several infections at subclinical level. Have you not had patients who were sick a couple of days, with weaknesses and low blood count, and then recovered?"

"Julia, my patients are the kind that they do not come to the doctor unless they are really sick. A couple of days weak and tired, they do not call me. They tough it out."

"I could be on the track of a major discovery"

"Well, I wish you luck. But do not ask me to collaborate. A disease at the subclinical level is not a wise use of my time. Do you know what I do most of the time? Fix wounds and broken bones. Fishing is one of the most, if not the most, hazardous line of work. There are accidents all the time, and some quite serious. Do you think that between surgeries I have the time and inclination to chase subclinical cases?"

"Still, if you were to let me have samples."

"Julia, I cannot go around taking samples for you."

"You take samples when you treat them for other things, don't you? All I ask you to do is to do an additional test. I developed this chemical that shows a reaction when the blood interests me. Just do the test, and any samples that show it, forward them to me."

Woodard sighs, and accepts the chemical. It is little work and if Julia is successful he might even get a mention in her paper.

Maggie goes back to see Barnabas and makes him a proposition. He can help her make surveys

"They pay for those. And you are the perfect survey taker, because no one will slam the door on your face. After you bite someone you have some control over them?"

"Some. It could be more, but it scares me."

"Why?"

He says that it is a two way street "We shared memories, you and I. I got yours as you got mine. And I once had greater mental contact with a woman I bit, I was shocked later to feel lust for a young man. It was her lust that I felt as it was mine. So I prefer not to get to close mentally."

"But enough to have control of them long enough to ask them questions."

"Yes."

"Good. I will get you the forms. This will get us some money to get started."

She mentions that with the surveys she hopes to get a full customer database that she can sell, or even start her own survey outfit.

"Then Joe will not have to be involved with those shady types any more."

David is excited to know that there is a new relative living at the Old House and wants to go there. Vicky cautions him that the place is dangerous, that he can have something fall on him. or fall through a hole.

"But if this cousin of ours is there, it cannot be that dangerous."

"He knows what he is doing, you do not."

"You met him, didn't you?"

Vicky equivocates here, and David catches her on it.

"I might have seen him moving in, not knowing who he was."

She instinctively touches her throat, but then changes the conversation. As David goes back to working on the math problems she gave him, she muses that the period between Independence and the Constituion of 1789 is not that well known, and that she has a first hand source...

Eric Lang talks to Julia, wanting to know why she is interested in what is going on in Collinsport

"I found a curious substance in the blood samples, and I'd like to have more of it."

"Why?"

"Because it is something I have never seen before, and we might find a use for it."

Lang grumbles. "All right, I will let you run with it. But remember, our experiments come first."

David sneaks into the Old House, and finds Barnabas' coffin. He studies it, and then smiles.

Carolyn picks up the phone, and after a few words goes pale. "You cannot... my mother..."

Then the phone goes dead.

Roger meets with Sam. He tells him that he wants to start painting again.

Sam asks about Burke.

"He set me free. I do not know why, but he did. And... and now I want to paint... I stopped doing it after he went to jail... maybe I was punishing myself. But now I want to take up where I left."

Willie goes to the basement, and when he looks over, he sees an explosive device over Barnabas' coffin.

"David.." he says. He dismantles the device. Fortunately it is an easy one.

He wonders who to tell about it. Not Elizabeth. Not Roger... maybe Vicky... Should he tell Barnabas?


	20. David v Barnabas II

Willie talks to Vicky who agrees that it will do not good to talk to Elizabeth or Roger.

Elizabeth will not hear of David being sent away or given therapy, and Roger cannot gainsay her. She will try to talk to him, and keep watch so that he does not go to the Old House.

"We might put a bell round his neck to warn that he is coming."

Woodard examines Maggie, to make sure that she is recovering well,

He draws blood from her, and ten talks to her about Joe.

"Joe is in trouble. He needs to stop making those contraband runs"

"Joe..."

"Maggie, back in the thirties, they brought booze from Canada through here. Now it is drugs... Maggie, you and Joe only think of the money, but drugs destroy lives... Maybe I have a soft spot for Joe, but I would not like to see him go to jail. Patterson suspects him, and will be laying a trap. I should not warn him, but... but, well, I am fond of him. I warn him this once. I will not warn him a second time. So talk sense to him. Or prepare to visit him in jail."

When she leaves, he tests the blood he took, and ships some of it to Julia. Hoffman.

Vicky goes to see Barnabas at night, with the questions he has for him. He is surprised to see her, but appreciates to have home delivery and bites her.

He senses that she is thinking of David and him. He asks her, and she tells him about David's attempt on him.

Barnabas feels fury rise in him, as his hands clench, and make strangling movements.

Then he hears the song "London Bridge"

"Olajuwon" he says.

He is still here, and goading him to destroy his family... He forces himself to calm down.

"David is the last of the Collins, since Carolyn does not seem willing to marry. If Olajuwon goaded me into killing him, he would have finally destroyed the family"

Vicky talks about David's disturbed history, how he almost killed his father. She also talks about Laura and how Roger married his own grandmother. And great-great-grandmother.

"And, looking at the records, Quentin Collins, who died unmarried in the Civil War was engaged to another Laura. The line broke there, but it began again with Jamison."

Barnabas wonders if he can get Elizabeth to do something about David. Or if he can scare some sense into him.

Carolyn is playing solitaire, visibly upset when David races downstairs, saying that there is a giant bat in his room.

Carolyn goes up but sees nothing. She tells him to calm down, that he must have dreamed it.

David goes back to bed, and on the nightstand he sees the bomb that he had put on Barnabas' coffin.

Julia Hoffman tests the new sample that Woodard sent him, the one from Maggie.

"Yes, the levels are higher now. Whatever happened, it did not stop with her, it is still going on. Just because something has no visible symptoms does not mean that it does not exist. And, if what I think is correct.."

She calls Jeff Clark to her office.

The next night David finds Barnabas in his room, fangs bared.

"I know what you did, David, what you tried to do. And I want to tell you that it must stop."

David screams and Barnabas disappears.

Carolyn and Roger go to his room, but of course, Barnabas has vanished. He tells them that Barnabas was there, and that he had fangs..

Vicky tells Roger that she is going to see Barnabas and that he should come with her.

Of course, when they come in, Barnabas opens the door, very surprised.

"I was about to go to bed."

Roger says that David NEEDS therapy, and asks Vicky to back him up.

Barnabas tells them that he is worried that David can get hurt if he comes to the Old House. Roger agrees, and apologizes.

Later Barnabas comes to David's bedside.

"You see, they did not believe you. So, you and I are going to have a talk. Like it or not, the future of the family rests on you, and I am going to make sure that you grow up properly." He makes him stare at his eyes and hypnotizes him. "We have a long way ahead, both of us."

The next day Carolyn goes into town and hears her name called. A voice that she hoped not to hear again. She turns, and Buzz Hackett is there.


	21. Buzz Hackett I

Maggie comes to pick up Barnabas "interviews", and also to tell him that she is getting him the documents he needs to move around, including a green card.

She then asks him to bite Joe Haskell and keep him under his control so that he does not go on any smuggling runs.

"I tell him not to, but he says that it is good money."

She also tells him that Roger is paying his father for painting lessons, so she has a bit more money to invest in her business.

Carolyn tells Buzz Hackett to go away, that there is nothing she can do to help him.

"Oh, I could stay with you."

She tells him that the arrangement she made with her family does not include harboring fugitives she once knew.

"Tell me, the arrangement the lawyer made with the courts, does it also include the Trenton incident?"

Carolyn goes pale.

"No, it doesn't. Well, you will present me to your family, and I am going to be your fiance.. Later, I will tell you what other help I need."

Vicky comes to see Barnabas, to bring him news of David, who for now is behaving, and to ask him for more details about the late eighteenth century. Barnabas does bite her, before answering.

Later Willie remonstrates with him.

"She keeps coming, and you keep biting her. Maggie does not pay you anything for her."

"It is just... well, it irritates me that she keeps asking me all about that time, and I want her to pay for the information."

"Yeah, did you notice how pale she is? She is coming here too often and you are biting her too often."

"And?"

"And I read that if you keep doing it, she can become as you are,"

"Where you read it?"

"Googled it."

"Googled?"

"Yeah, at the library. In any case, you do not want her to become what you are."

Barnabas agrees that he does not want that, and tells him that when she comes next, he should send her away.

Carolyn introduces Buzz to her family, who dislike him.

Elizabeth tells Carolyn to send him away, but she tells him that it will be a big scandal if he does.

Elizabeth is furious with Carolyn for not having told her everything, but cannot change it.

She then confronts Roger, and tells him that the painting lessons with Sam must stop, as he is not paying attention to his job in the cannery.

Jeff Clark is at the bookstore, overhearing comments, and watching out for someone who looks pale.

He sees Vicky and talks to her.

He charms her and says "I have a feeling that I have known you from somewhere. Back in the past."

"You ever been to New York?"

"No."

"Then we cannot have met"

"Maybe in a past life."

She gives him a strange look and moves away. She gets dizzy and faints. As she is taken by the ambulance, Clark calls Julia Hoffman on his cell phone.

Roger grumbles about Elizabeth's treating him as a child, then he meets Carolyn.

"That man is no fiance of yours, is he?"

"No", Carolyn admits.

"A blackmailer from your dark past?"

Carolyn nods.

Behind them Olajuwon smiles.

"Maybe we can solve both our problems if we put our heads together." Roger says.

Woodard writes his notes of Vicky, who seems to have a case of anemia. Should ask her what diet she follows.. Or check on her cosmetics... He tests her blood with the chemical that Julia gave him, and sees the results go through the roof.


	22. Buzz Hackett II

Roger and Carolyn talk about Hackett. Roger asks Carolyn to tell him everything.

"I will not judge you, I am the last one to pass judgement, with my history. But I need to know how to bait the trap."

Woodard calls Patterson to tell him about Vicky, but Patterson is angry with him.

"You warned Joe Haskell, didn't you? He did not show up, as I was sure he would."

"Has it occurred to you that he may be innocent?"

"Damn it, what is it with you and Haskell? Did you have an affair with his mom, and now you think he is your son?" Patterson is too angry to listen to anything that Woodard tries to tell him, and Woodard hangs up with a sigh.

"I guess it is up to me..."

Carolyn tells Hackett that he cannot stay here forever, that sooner or later the FBI will track him here. She tells him to talk to Joe Haskell to go on his boat to Canada or any other place he wants. Haskell will know how to keep his mouth shut.

"Oh, I will leave, sweetie, but it will be with money."

"Money! It is all about money with you? I thought that you believed in the cause." "The cause... the cause... yes, you did believe it, didn't you, little rich girl? I did. But I also believe in money."

Willie remonstrates with Vicky, telling her that she should stop seeing Barnabas for a few days. She says that she has a few more questins before she writes her article.

"The article can wait a few days. You already fainted. If you keep coming it will be much worse."

Elizabeth tells Carolyn that Hackett must go. She asks how much he would need to go away.

"I am negotiating with him."

"Well, finish negotiating. I want him out of here. Out of this house. I cannot stand the way he spies on everything."

"I do not think that he went down to the cellar."

Elizabeth glares at her.

"Come on, mother, the cellar is the one place you cannot stand anyone being there."

Roger talks to Hackett.

"We do not have as much money as you think. Business has taken a downturn. Now, if we were to find the jewel cache.."

"What jewel cache?"

"It is a legend. Seems that an ancestor buried the jewels in the cellar of the house.. At least that's what they tell."

Night falls and Vicky, in spite of the warnings, goes to see Barnabas because she's got a whole new set of questions. Woodard, certain that Laura is back, and that she has gotten hold of Vicky, tracks her as she goes to the Old House. Barnabas is about to leave with the new set of questions that Maggie has given her. He finds Vicky at the door, with her open notepad. The irritation gets the best of him and he bares his fangs.

Behind her, Woodard gasps. Barnabas hears it and goes after him. He catches him, and bites him.


	23. Buzz Hackett III

Woodard comes to in the Old House, feeling the pull of Barnabas' mind. Willie explains things to him.

"I am surprised that he did not kill me."

"Nah, he's not stupid. Like this guy I knew in jail told me, he does no want no homicide detective looking into his business."

"And now?"

"Now, like everyone else he's bit, you cannot tell others what he is, and he is bound to ask you to do things now and then. And he will feed off you now and then."

"Like Vicky?"

"Nah, Vicky irritated him. She kept asking him about history, and for him it meant reliving the pain of losing everything and everyone he loved. So, he punished her by feeding from her when he did not need to."

Barnabas comes in, and brings in the questionnaries.

"Let's start, Doctor, what soap do you use?"

Woodard is surprised.

"I am taking surveys for Maggie. She pays me. So, Doctor, what soap do you use?"

The next day, Buzz sneaks into the cellar, and starts knocking on the cellar to see if he hears some hollow sound, or any sings that may be left of a burial.

"If the jewels are there, I will find them."

Roger watches from the sidelines gun in hand.

Carolyn has been keeping Elizabeth distracted, as she had told Buzz he would, but then tells Elizabeth that she hears sounds from the cellar.

Elizabeth races down to the cellar, and find Buzz moving boxes and checking on the ground.

Elizabeth attacks him, screaming. Buzz hits her so that she falls down uncouncious.

Roger races in, and shoots Buzz.

"He killed Liz!" he screams.

He goes down to make sure that Elizabeth is dead, but Vicky has arrived, and calls 911

"I called 911." she says. "And I think that Elizabeth is alive."

Roger gives her a nasty look but then pretends to be relieved.

Elizabeth is taken to the hospital, and Roger maintains that he shot Hackett because he tried to kill Elizabeth.

The sheriff grumbles that probably there is more to it, but he knows that he cannot touch the Collins family, that the town is too dependent on the family for their jobs to tolerate an investigation.

Later Roger tells Carolyn that where it not for Vicky calling 911, he would have finished Elizabeth.

"Well, she is out of it for a while"

"Yeah, and I hope she did not instruct her lawyer how to run us."

Later Vicky tells Barnabas that she is sure that Roger tried to kill Elizabeth.

"I cannot prove it. It was just the look in his face when I said that she was still alive."

Barnabas muses that Olajuwon is still out there, trying to destroy the family, by making them turn against each other.

Vicky has some more information about Daniel. Quentin, Morgan, and Gabriel were the children of his second, later marriage. He had had two children with his first wife, and all three were killed in an accident after he had decided to withdraw from the figth against slavery which he, following Joshua, had been bankrolling.

Olajuwon is not yet finished with the Collins family.

"Will I be the final instrument of its destruction?"

Julia Hoffman shows at Woodard's office, telling him that she is on to something.

He pretends complete disinterest.

She talks about Vicky's fainting and what she thinks happened.

Woodard says that he's got really sick people to take care of, and cannot waste time looking for what is to him the equivalent of the common cold.

She leaves the office, and he sinks his head on his arms, unable to tell what he knows.


	24. Julia moves in I

Julia approaches Vicky, telling her that she is an amateur historian, which makes Vicky very much interested. She gives Julia all kinds of historic data that Julia pretends to be interested in, while asking her about the current Collins family.

"Because in this town, they are the ones that drive history"

She notes Vicky's reluctance to talk about Barnabas, saying only "he just moved in and I did not have much contact with him yet"

Reading her body language Julia knows that Vicky is lying.

Joe has a tense telephone conversation with some unnamed interlocutor. He says that Patterson is coming closer and if they try to use his boat again, they will be arrested. He rub the neck wounds as he says that. He sounds scared, but relaxes when the man at the other end offers him a new opportunity.

"Yes, I think that I can do that."

At night, Woodard feels Barnabas' summons. He tries to fight it, but is pulled by it. And he gets the words "don't forget your bag"

He is surprised to find himself pulled to the road, instead of the Old House, to a car wreck where Barnabas has pulled the victims out.

He looks at him surprised, but rends first aid, and calls an ambulance on his cell phone. Barnabas explains that he felt the distress of the woman in the car, because he has a link with her, as he had fed from her.

"So you came to rescue her?" Woodard is skeptical.

"She pulled at me with her need."

Julia stops by at the Old House and meets Willie, who warns her that there is a construction going on and that it is dangerous.

Joe Haskell calls Barnabas and has a proposition for him. There is this financier coming to Maine fora fishing vacation. He can be made to rent Joe's boat. All that Barnabas has to do is put him in his power, and then get stock market tips from him.

"And that can get us a lot more money than the surveys"

Woodard comes by the Old House to tell Barnabas that the accident victims are recovering. He talks with Willie and says that whatever Barnabas took from them, it was well worth it.

"I might end up liking him"

Willie tells him about Julia's visit. "He may have to deal with her, too"

Barnabas comes in, and tells both Willie and Woodard of Joe's proposition.

"Stock market tips?" Woodard explodes "That would be insider trading. And while surveys are perfectly legal, insider traiding is a Federal offense"

"You do not want to be the first vampire busted for white collar crime." adds Willie


	25. Julia moves in II

Julia talks to Woodard and gets to the point.

There is a vampire in Collinsport, and she wants to know who is it, so that she can talk to him.

Woodard tells her that she's delusional, but she tells him that he should never play poker, since his tells are so obvious.

"You know who is it."

Woodard tells her that it is safer if she does not approach him.

"He has not killed you."

"There is the potential for it. I have seen his mind when he... fed off me. I could feel burning rage that can come out if he is pushed. When he went for me, I thought that I was going to die, so great was that rage. I saw him tear up both his uncle and his aunt. He has done it, and he can do it again. Do not corner him. Do not threaten him in any way."

"Who is it?"

Woodard shakes his head.

"Is it Barnabas Collins?"

Woodard does not answer.

"You really should not play poker, Dave" she says, smiling, as she gets up.

Maggie takes a break from her job and as she goes out, she is accosted by two men with guns.

"Where is Joe Haskell?" They ask her.

"In his boat."

"Well, he'll come back for you."

They take her into their car and drive away.

"Why?" she asks.

"He has failed to come through for us, and he better pay up if he wants to see you again."

Elizabeth is resting in the hospital. She sees a new flower bouquet next to her bed. She picks up the card and reads "Jason McGuire."

Woodard comes to see Barnabas to warn him of Julia Hoffman's presence, but finds Willie alone.

"He had to go out. Maggie is in danger. He sensed it."

Joe is forced to come down his boat, when the gangsters put a gun to Maggie's head.

"Just let her go. She has nothing to do with this."

"You owe us. And you better pay"

"I do not have it now. And I can go back to making runs."

"The boss wants to make an example of you."

This is when Barnabas comes barging in, He tears at the gunmen, except for one that jumps into the water. Joe has been shot and Barnabas summons Woodard.

Woodard comes and seizes the situation.

"You better get rid of the bodies" he says.

He pulls the bullet out of Joe's wound.

"And get rid of this bullet too."

Barnabas is surprised.

"I am by law obliged to report all gunshot wounds to the police. But not accidents with fishing equipment. I will admit him as such an accident. So, get rid of the bullet."

With Joe in the hospital, and Maggie being comforted, Woodard and Barnabas talk.

Woodard tells Barnabas that he better take first responder training, so he can handle accidents quickly, and not need summon him.

He also tells him about Julia Hoffman.

"I do not know what she wants, but you better be careful with her. Maybe you should pay her a visit and convince her to get off your back."


	26. Julia moves in III

Barnabas appears in Julia's room who is not surprised.

"Welcome Mr. Collins. I have an offer for you."

"You have no idea the danger you are courting."

"I can offer you a cure for your condition. I have seen it before, and I learned a great deal."

"You have? Someone like me?"

"Yes."

"Did you cure him?"

"Her. I did my best, and I learned a great deal. But she had to run away because they were tracking her down. Maybe she will come back.."

"And I am supposed to entrust myself to you?"

"You could see the sun again. You could be free of this need to attack people and make them forget. You could have a normal life again. You could have again what you lost."

The next day Patterson talks to Woodard

"You would not know anything of those torn corpses floating in the water?"

"No."

"And Joe Haskell being in the hospital has nothing to do, though there is a big bloodstain by his boat?"

"He had an accident and he called me to patch him up."

"And you did not see fit to inform me?"

"Why should I? The fishermen have all kinds of accidents and I patch them up and you never asked about them."

"Dave, if you keep at it, you will end up in jail, with Joe Haskell."

Jason McGuire visits Elizabeth who receives him warmly as the good friend he was to her.

He says that while Paul, her husband, was his friend, he grew indignant about the way he treated her, because she deserved much better.

He then confesses that he is in a bad situation. She offers to help him. He says that he does not want charity, that he needs a job. She immediately hires him for the cannery.

At night Barnabas and Woodard talk.

Woodard says that yes, Joe Haskell is his son, and he feels duty bound to protect him. He worries that unless he stops playing with criminals, he will end up in jail, no matter what he does.

Barnabas tells him about Julia's offer.

"Do you want to take it?"

"It would make things much better for me."

"Yes, it would. But first you must finish the job that Maggie gave you and get paid. You need to figure out a budget. Do you know how much groceries cost? Because you are going to need it. Those jewels will not last forever and you need a source of income. Learn a trade, figure out a budget, then decide when you can do it."

"Yeah."

"Also, there is something that I warn my other patients about. This will solve some problems, but not all. Let's suppose you are human again. You will still be out of your time. You will still have lost all of your family. You will still be grieving."

"And I would still have Olajuwon." "Yes, you must think what might happen if you seemed to escape his sentence."

Barnabas sees Julia and says that tempting as the offer is, he cannot do it yet. That there are considerations.

Julia smiles "I understand. If you change your mind, call me." She gives him her card.

"And you will...?"

"I will wait. You will come to me sooner or later."


	27. Jason Mc Guire I

Returning from a feeding, Barnabas sees a white figure on the grounds.

"Josette!" he recognizes her.

He tries to follow her, but she vanishes.

Maggie sees Joe at the hospital.

"We almost got killed" she reproaches him.

She tries to make him swear to give up his drug runs. "Call the sheriff. Offer to turn evidence. Anything but that."

Willie meets Jason McGuire, who recognizes him.

"You do not know me." he says. "If you remember me, it will cost you. You can be sent back to the big house too easily."

Willie nods.

"I guess that there were no jewels here after all." Jason adds. "Well, if you find them, you are welcome to them"

Barnabas tells Willie about Josette, and Willie says that she has been haunting the place for quite a while.

She is supposed to protect the family, but she is quite ineffective, considering the amount of grief they have known.

"But the family survived, in spite of Olajuwon... she does what she can..."

Jason starts his new job at the cannery and tries to ingratiate himself with the coworkers.

He meets Roger, who wants to know what happened with the money that Paul Stoddard embezzled.

"He did not share it with me, if you wonder."

"You might have deceived my sister, but I know a flim-flam man when I see one."

"Because you are one yourself. You live off the kindness of your sister, and are not even properly grateful"

Barnabas walks the grounds, calling for Josette. He comes to Widow's Hill, where she died, where he hears her voice, but she does not show herself.

Jason is charming to Elizabeth, and lets her talk about her woes. He puts his hand above her.

"I will always be your friend."

She smiles shyly and says "I hoped you would be more than friend."

Roger talks to Carolyn about Jason. Carolyn wants to know what Jason had to do with her father's disappearance.

"Carolyn, we hid certain things from you, to protect you, but now you are old enough. Your father embezzled from the company. Quite a large amount. I was going to expose him, and I talked to Liz about it. She asked me not to cause a scandal. She would talk to him and offer him the chance to make restitution. But he got wind of it and disappeared. We never found the money. Liz did not want a scandal so she just reported him missing. And years later, she had him declared dead."

"And Jason?"

"Jason was a friend, who somehow was there. He acted as if she regretted that Liz was already married to Paul and kind of flirted. Was supposed to be a friend of Paul, and nothing will make me change the idea that the two of them took the money."

Willie tells Barnabas about Jason, that he knew him as a con man who had avoided being caught.

"But he is a crook, nevertheless."

"And he is now charming Elizabeth?"

"Yes."

"Maybe I should do something..."

"Do not do anything that can release Olajuwon, please."

"Maybe this is what Josette is trying to warn me about."

Jason and Elizabeth kiss.


	28. Jason McGuire II

Jason and Elizabeth make plans for their wedding.

Jason talks about going on a cruise, but Elizabeth is reluctant to go, to leave the house unguarded.

Jason understands. It is part of the past that they wish to leave behind.

"I can take care of it." he tells her. "There is no reason for it to be in the cellar."

"But you would be seen"

"I would be renovating the house, or lookig for treasure...no one will find it strange after all these years."

Julia talks to Woodard, asking him to help convince Barnabas to accept her help. "

I adviced him not to, due to his circumstances."

Julia wants to know what it is like to be in the thrall of another.

"Are you sure it is your decision, not something that he wants you to?"

"I can tell when he commands me, and this time, he was befuddled and accepted my advice."

"You know what he is."

"Yes. And I know how dangerous it is for you to try."

"If Dr. Lang was such a fuddy duddy as you, he'd never get anything done."

Jason sees Willie as he leaves a man that he knows to be a fence.

"So Willie does have something to peddle."

He comes in and asks the fence what did Willie sell him.

"Sorry, I do not share information."

After Jason gives him some bills, he lets him see the jewel that Willie brought.

"So Willie did find that cache, after all..."

Roger and Carolyn talk about Elizabeth's impending marriage, and that Jason is talking about a honeymoon cruise.

"On one hand, it is good if she leaves. On the other..."

"On the other you do not trust McGuire."

"He is pennyless and she is rich. If anything happened to her, he'd inherit."

"Is he capable of murder?"

"I do not know what he is capable of."

Carolyn says that he has been down at the cellar and that Elizabeth did not stop him.

"Maybe you and I can dig into the cellar."

"But if mother..."

"We can give her something to help her sleep, and do some digging at night, when he is at the hotel."

"And if Vicky?"

"We can drug her too. Maybe we can get David to drug her. He'd like that."

Woodard talks to Barnabas about Julia's visit.

"There is something that Julia said. About then man she works for, Eric Lang."

"What did she say?"

"Enough to make me suspect that he is conducting unethical experiments in his clinic. It is his clinic, and his patients are mentally disturbed, so they cannot tell people what he does to them."

"And you think that Miss Hoffman..?"

"She is conducting experiments about the biochemical basis for mental disorders, or at least that's what she says. I want to know more."

"Why?"

"I am afiliated with the Maine Board of Licensure in Medicine. If I run across an unethical doctor, I am supposed to turn them in."

"And you want to know more about Dr. Lang."

"Could you try to get information out of Miss Hoffman? Pretend that you want her to try to cure you?"

"Is it important to you?"

"Very much."


	29. Jason McGuire III

Carolyn talks to David, and tells him that if he wants to get out of studying, he should do what she did once, which was to drug the governess.

"I then could go out at night and no one knew."

David asks if she still has that drug. She hems and haws and then says that she may still have in the top shelf of her closet.

Roger drops the sedative in the decanter of sherry, not before pouring himself a big glass and hiding it for later.

"It is a waste of good sherry if you ask me."

Carolyn goes down to meet with Roger, leaving David alone. David does not waste any time finding the sleeping powder, and putting it in the diet drink that Vicky has regularly. He is not sure how much to put, so he prefers to put too much rather than too little.

Jason and Elizabeth come in, and while Jason wants to stay, Roger says about keeping proper appearances. Jason does not want an argument, so he leaves.

Elizabeth berates Roger for being such a stickler for property, when he did not care for it.

Roger sighs. "I do not get that many chances to lecture people, so let me enjoy it."

He makes as if he's pouring himself a glass of sherry.

"But what are my manners?" he asks.

He gives it to Elizabeth, while he retrieves the one he had prepared earlier.

Carolyn checks on Vicky who has fallen asleep all dressed up. She is concerned that her breathing may not be normal, that David might have given her too much... Well, they will call the ambulance for her when they are done digging.

Barnabas walks on Widow's Hill, calling for Josette.

She appears to him. "Oh, Barnabas, you did not escape any more than I did."

She tells him that yes, she loved him.

"And I loved you too."

"And now Olajuwon has both of us, to punish over and over for the slave trade."

"I know what my punishment is, but what is yours?"

"To haunt the Collins family, to try to protect them, and to fail. And yet I protected them as best I could. I reminded them of the price to be paid each generation in the service done to slaves and descendant of slaves. Every generation has to pay the price, and at the same time inflict pain on themselves. Roger marched for Civil Rights, and returned married to Laura. Carolyn threw herself into the cause, and it led her to too many bad decisions. In all generations someone pays the price. You are the first one to do so."

"Is there no way out, no mercy?"

"Olajuwon knows no mercy. Maybe the one on released him could show us mercy, but why should he or she do it?"

Roger digs in the cellar, glad that Jason has shown them where to dig. Half an hour later he finds an old trunk.

He smiles. "At last we know my sister's secret."

Carolyn checks on Vicky, whose breathing has grown more ragged.

As she does not hear Roger digging anymore, she calls for an ambulance for her. She berates herself for not explaining to David what the proper dosage was. If Vicky should die... She sees herself in the mirror and hear voices accusing her of murder. "And Miss Winters is the latest victim."

Willie talks to Barnabas making plans for the future. "When we renovate this place, we can turn it into a hotel, or a bed and breakfast. Think of it. You no longer have to chase anyone. They will come to you, and pay you besides. Not year round, but still, it would be a sweet set up for you."

Barnabas thinks that the idea has merit. If only Olajuwon does not find another way of hurting them.

When Elizabeth gets up she is greeted by the news that Vicky is in the hospital, recovering. That she may have drunk something that she should not.

"I think that David needs to explain us a few things." Carolyn says.

Then Roger comes and asks "Tell, me Elizabeth, why do you have an empty trunk buried in the cellar? Nothing, just air. Did you think that we were going to have a shortage of air and put away a supply?"

"What you do you, mean, and empty trunk?"

"Come see it." Elizabeth looks at the trunk. It is empty. Nothing in it.

"Why would you bury an empty trunk?" Roger asks again.

"Paul is not here!" Elizabeth cried. "So what have I been keeping watch for?"

Jason comes at his charming best but Elizabeth slaps him. "You lied to me! You told me that Paul was dead. You buried the trunk. I saw you bury the trunk!"

Jason sighs, and realizes that the jig is up.

"No, Paul is not dead. You only glanced him, but he played dead and I helped him do it."

"And you were partners in the embezzlement!" Roger says.

"Yes." "And you split the money?"

"Yes." Elizabeth glares at him.

"Get out of my sight right now. And be thankful that I do not want any scandal. If you are here tomorrow, I might kill you for real." J

ason leaves followed by Roger's snickers. Elizabeth collapses crying.

Carolyn sits by Vicky's bedside crying silently. She cannot walk away from her past... Woodard comes to check on Vicky. He asks Carolyn how Vicky could have overdosed.

"David... " she says. "But it was my fault. I told him that I had played this trick on my own governess..."

Woodard checks on Vicky's throat, but sees no new wounds.

"You know, David is a disturbed boy."

"You tell that to my mother. I have given up on it."

Jason comes to the Old House. Now that his chances of marrying Elizabeth are gone, he wants the jewels that Willie found. Willie denies it, but Jason forces his way in at gunpoint.

"I want the jewels, Willie, and you will tell me where they are."

Willie protests but Jason backhands him. "I know you have them, and I want them. The question will be how much pain are you going to endure before you tell me."

Barnabas wakes up and feels Willie's distress. He shows up and sees him tied up with Jason burning him with cigarettes. He grabs Jason and tears him apart, feasting on his blood.


	30. Eric Lang I

Willie is horrified to see what Barnabas did to Jason. Barnabas tries to reassure him, but he remembers Josette's eyes when he killed Jeremiah.

"It is not that, Willie..."

He sighs and goes out, to Widow's Hill.

Eric Lang tells Julia that Experiment #27 is being terminated, and that she should prepare her cocktail by tomorrow. She flinches.

"Will you dissect?"

"The family will be grateful for me to arrange the cremation."

Julia sighs but Eric snickers. "It is not as if it is the first time you prepared that cocktail. It will be a blessed release for the family, and for the patient too."

Josette comes to Barnabas as he stands by Widow's Hill.

"I do not hate you. I did not undrestand then. This is what Olajuwon forces on you. But remember you only do it to protect those you love."

"I feasted on him like an animal."

"Yes. Because Olajuwon commands you to."

"I thought that I could live some sort of good life, even with my condition."

"And you still can, but you must know that this will happen again and again. As I know that I can try to protect the family, and fail most of the time. But not when it matters."

Willie has disposed of Jason's body and washed the blood off as best he could when Woodard stops by.

He says that Barnabas should have a talk with David, because he suspects David of poisoning Vicky.

"And you know that Elizabeth will do nothing about it. Barnabas seems to be the only one that can control the boy."

The next morning Elizabeth goes out into town, arousing the talk of everybody, and goes into the travel agency. She says that it is time she went out into the world again.

At Wyncliffe, Jeff Clark forcibly restrainst a patient who screams as Julia comes in, with her hypodermic in hand.

"Use it now before he breaks free." Clark tells her.

Julia flinches.

"It is not the first time you done, it, doc."

She grits her teeths and mutters not being a MD to do an injection.

Jeff snickers and commands her to do it. She does.

At night, Barnabas sees David, and forces him to tell him what he did to Vicky. He learns that he got the idea from Carolyn, who also told him where to find the drug. He commands David not to do that again, and goest to talk to Carolyn.


	31. Eric Lang II

Barnabas confronts Carolyn, and bites her.

Under his influence she admits to baiting David to drug Vicky so that she would not interfere.

She also confesses that the killing of Buzz Hackett was meant to kill Elizabeth too.

Barnabas is aghast at his murderous family, who have not yet killed each other just out of dumb luck.

"I guess that I will have to watch out for your plots"

Woodard has a visitor, a young lady who is sure that his favorite uncle was killed at Windcliffe

"The rest of the family did not care. He was an embarrassment and they were happy to have him away. But I visited him, and he told me that they were doing things to him, and that they were going to kill him."

He asks her if she talked to the police, and she says that they do not care. That of course, mental patients accuse their caretakers of trying to kill them.

He promises to talk to the sheriff, but he knows that the sheriff will not listen to him these days.

He does need Barnabas...

Vicky recovers and gets an update on everything.

She is told that Elizabeth is going on a vacation, and that Roger is considering having David go on some sort of therapy.

"Of course it will have to be at home. If we sent him away, Elizabeth's lawyer will make life difficult for us." Carolyn explains.

"So my services are still needed." Vicky says.

"If you really want to."

Vicky hesitates. Being poisoned by his charge is not something she likes, BUT she is in the middle of a research project and if she left her job, she would be cut off from her research, and from Barnabas...

She grudgingly agrees to stay.

Julia is checking on her old notes on Clara, the vampire that she treated previously, so that she can compare with the data she will get on Barnabas. She notices a scrabbled note on the margin in Lang's signature. "Term..." Shaken she goes down to the room where Lang keeps his speciments and finds a jar with a heart in it, and the note on it says "vampire heart." Lang has dissected Clara...

Woodard talks to Barnabas, who tells him about the family of murderers he's stuck with.

Elizabeth tried to kill her husband and believed that she had him buried in the cellar.

Roger had run over a man and framed his rival for it, and then he conspired with Carolyn to murder Elizabeth, along with Buzz Hackett.

David tried to kill his father, blow up Barnabas, and poisoned Vicky, after Carolyn prompted him to do it.

Woodard cannot help laughing and says that Barnabas might well turn up to be the island of sanity in his family..

He then tells him about the visit he had, and that he thinks that Lang should be stopped.

"I would like to dig into his records, but that is not that easy. But you could get Julia Hoffman to do it for us."

Barnabas agrees to look into it. He picks up the card that Julia gave him and says taht he will give her a call.


	32. Eric Lang III

Julia comes to see Barnabas who welcomes her, but tells her that there are cosiderations that make him unwilling.

"Which ones?"

"Monetary ones"

"I am willing to work for free, just to be able to say that I cured you"

"I have been told that I need a nest egg before I am again needing groceries."

"So?"

"So I would have you take it slowly."

"But you will let me run a few tests, don't you?"

"Yes, that you can do."

Woodard receives a call that the patient that had come to him is in Wyncliffe, making accusations against Lang and is brandishing a gun.

He goes there and manages to calm her down

"This is not the way"

Lang wants to call the police, but Woodard sneers at him.

"You do not want that."

They have heated words, and Lang looks a Woodard with suspicion. He knows more than he lets on.

Josette appears to Willie. "Barnabas is in danger." she tells him. "You must guard him."

Julia meets Barnabas, who wants to know more about her, and where he works.

"Does the man you work for knows what you are doing?"

"No."

"Are you sure?" He corners her "What are you not telling me, Miss Hoffman?"

"Doctor. I am a PhD in Biochemitsry. I am a Doctor."

"I see. So what are you not telling me?"

Woodard comes in "Yes, Julia, what are you not telling us? "What is Eric Lang doing in Wyncliffe?"

Julia stammers and tries to get away, but Barnabas pinions her.

"You know what he is doing. If you do not tell us, you are as guilty as he is."

She stammers but cannot deny

"Has he killed patients in his experiments?" Woodard asks.

Julia nods.

Barnabas muses "That other vampire you treated, did she really go away?"

"No, he killed her too."

"And you wanted to turn me over to him.."

"No, I would not! I kept it a secret! I had to. He has been blackmailing me... he's got the proof in his safe, and I cannot open it."

"Well, we'll figure out a way to open it."

"I can just tear it off its hingers" Barnabas says.

They make plans to go to Wyncliffe, the three of them the following night.

Outside, Jeff Clark listens to what is said.


	33. Eric Lang IV

Eric Lang shows up at Woodard's

He puts a gun to his side. "You will come with me now, Doctor"

They meet with Jeff Clark at the Old House who is covering Willie and Julia.

"You thought that you could use the vampire against me?" he tells them.

"We know what you are doing." Woodard blurts out.

"Too bad that you cannot tell anyone about it."

He shoots Woodard and Willie. He considers shooting Julia but shrughs. "You will keep quiet, as you always keep quiet."

He ties her to a chair, and between him and Clarkthey carry Barnabas' coffin, chained, into the car.

"When you get loose you know where to come back, Miss Hoffman"

They drive away, and do not see David crouched under the bushes.

When they leave, David comes in

"What happened"

"Release me, David." Julia asks.

She checks Woodard and Willie.

"Willie is still alive." she says. "Call 911 on him. I am going after Barnabas"

At Wyncliffe, Lang and Clark share some liquor as they wait for Barnabas to wake up.

"Wouldn't you rather cut him open now?"

"Later. There are more experiments I want to run."

Julia races to Joe Haskell, and asks him for a gun. "Barnabas is in trouble" she tells him.

With dawn, Barnabas wakes up and finds hismself unable to move.

"Yes, I know how to paralize a vampire. So you are going to cooperate with me."

"Willie..."

"I think that he is dead. Same as Woodard"

Barnabas closes his eyes and summons Maggie and Joe, trying to give them as much information as possible.

Julia comes in, red eyed, and looking beaten down.

"So you are back."

"I have nowhere else to go" she admits.

"Yes. and you know what I have on you.."

"I should have never..."

" But you did. And that proof does not leave my safe."

At that moment the car driven by Haskell and Maggie crashes throuugh the gate.

Lang sends Clark to investigate and that's when Julia shoots him and releases Barnabas.

"He..." Barnabas begins to say.

"No time. You said you'd open the safe. Please do. Probably he has information about you to."

Barnabas tears open the door safe, and Julia starts grabbing all the documents there. Maggie and Joe come in dragging a bound Clark.

"We need to get out of there. Fast. When we leave I will call 911 on here, and we'll come out with some explanation as to what went there.

"He killed Willie and Woodard."

"Yes. We can let them find out enough of what went on here. But not all. You can come back and plant the evidence later." They load the coffin into Joe's car and drive away.

Jeff Clark relases himself and runs away.

In Collinsport Barnabas is told that Willie still lives, and is in the hospital.

They go quickly through the papers with the help of Maggie and Joe.

Joe pockets the notebook with Barnabas' name on it, while Maggie gets hold of the DVDs.

"I will open these on my computer."

Barnabas collapses in a chair. "Olajuwon... both the doc and Willie were my friends, so he took them away."


	34. Note2

Note:

I wanted Woodard there because he seemed quite capable to tell Barnabas to cut the crap every now and then.

I also wanted continuity between the early Barnabas and the later one, as I did not have the luxury of a long flashback after which people did not remember the old Barnabas all that well.

So...

Then it was Dr. Lang. Somehow the idea of him working at the hospital and creating a monster in the basement of his house did not seem to be very practical. But let him run Wyncliffe, and experiment on the patients there. That makes him a very credible antagonist, and most important, he could do more than one experiment. He might have quite a number of them.

Which means that his "experiments" are going to be popping up every now and then, when we may be at a loss for a storyline. Eric Lang is the gift that keeps on giving.

In any case, we are now at the point of the beginning of 1968, with all the important events done, including Willie in the hospital...

And I am serioulsy thinking about Barnabas opening an inn...


	35. Interlude

Maggie sorts the files she got from Lang's computer.

She notes that they are encrypted and that she will have to find the key. Hopefully Lang left it in another file. She hopes to get them translated.

She notices Joe leafing through a notebook.

"What is it?"

"Miss Hoffman's notes on Barnabas Collins"

"You should give it to her."

"With the explanations that she is giving the authorities, it is better for her for it to be here. And who knows, one day it might be useful to us"

Barnabas paces on Widow's Hill. He is distraught because in his grief he was careless with the one he was feeding on, but managed to stop in time. He keeps seeing Jeremiah, Abigail, and Jason McGuire and knows that the potential for it is very much in him. J

osette appears to him to console him.

"But you did stop."

"One day I won't be able to. Maybe I should ask Willie, when he comes back to put an end to me."

"You know that Olajuwon will not allow it."

"Yes. Olajuwon needs to punish me... I wonder why he did not allow Lang to have his way with me. It would have been fitting."

"He might, but Lang had a couple of black men among his 'experiments' so he deserved punishment too. And if Lang killed you, as he would, Olajuwon would not be allowed to punish you anymore."

Barnabas sighs, knowing that his pain will go on.

Vicky receives a letter from Burke Devlin telling her that he is being put on probation, and has to prove himself. He asks her to forgive him for all the damage he did, and tells her to send Roger his good wishes.

She goes down to talk to Carolyn who is getting drunk.

"I know what you told David to do" she says.

"And?"

"And that I stopped you and Roger from murdering Elizabeth."

"And what will you do with that knowledge?"

"Barnabas also knows, and I know too that he has control of you, that he will not allow you to hurt me."

"It was never you. I just wanted to be free. Me and Roger...You have no idea what living under my mother's rule is like."

"You and Roger could move away."

"No, we could not."

"Well, try to solve your problems without killing anyone, please."

"Why don't you just give notice? Given David's history, no one would question you for leaving a student who tried to poison you."

"This place is convenient for me. And we may reach an understanding the three of us."

Barnabas talks to Maggie, telling her that his idea of opeining an inn might not be a good idea.

"I have this terrible rage inside of me, and it might be dangerous for the guests."

"Barnabas, if with what all you lost you did not go on a rampage, then you will not. Remember you only killed McGuire because he was hurting Willie. You do not kill wantonly."

"But..."

"An inn is a perfect set up for you. You do not have to go out to find blood. They come to you, and pay you besides. And they come back and bring friends. You can ask if they have any medical conditions, as you want to be prepared if there is an emergency. You got first responder training, you tell them, so you can handle emergencies. What you need to do is talk to Roger Collins."

"Why him?"

"Because you can make a deal that includes payments to him. He wants very much a source of income that does not depend on Elizabeth. You can be that. And he can then dump his cannery job, and go get drunk with Pops and paint, as he always wanted to."

"You seems quite easy with the idea of me feeding on tourists."

"We all feed on tourists one way or another."

Julia talks to her lawyer. He says that he can get probation for her, as in the end she stopped Lang.

"But you better start finding another career, because the one you have has just gone down the toilet."

He says that they are digging the grounds of Wyncliffe and finding secret graves.

"Probably homeless and drifters, that he used in experiments. You could not help identify them, could you?"

"There were things that were strictly off limits to me."

"And you never questioned it, of course. For an intelligent woman you could be very stupid , Miss Hoffman."

Barnabas meets with Josette who tells him that there is a bit of mercy coming their way. She points to a side of a hill, and he sees a secret door.

"Come in."

They enter and he finds himself in a strangely furnished room.

"It his room I can take physical form, and you are restored to humanity. Here at last we can make love."


	36. Adam I

Barnabas and Josette lie together in bed, telling each other how much they love each other.

Josette is said because she says. "It will not last"

Olajuwon comes and reminds them how slave families were torn apart, even children taken from ther mother's arms and sold. So, they are to be separated.

Barnabas pleads for mercy, but Olajuwon mocks him.

Josette tells him that he can come back to this room when he needs help or guidance.

"And if you really need me, I will come."

She then vanishes with Olajuwon, as Barnabas rages.

Julia comes to see Willie, who is recovering. She fills him in on what happened.

"The doc, he did not make it, did he?"

"No."

"Shame, he was a good guy."

She asks him about his plans.

"We still got a house to restore and turn into an inn."

A farmer comes out as the chickens gets agitated. He takes his shotgun thinking it is a fox, and is met with a man whose face is scarred and with burns.

He warns him, but the man pushes him away and then throws him angrily, after which he grabs a couple of chickens and takes them away into the bush.

Vicky talks with Carolyn

"Who is running the business now that Elizabeth is gone?"

Carolyn just shrugs.

"I guess it means that you do not care."

"I really don't. This place is a jail to me, so I do not care what happens to it."

"And Roger of course, is out having fun. So no one is."

"And you care?"

"I want a power of attorney to help run it."

"And shares, of course?"

"Yes. But I want to make sure that there is a business. With you two in charge, the place might go under. You are going to need a manager, if you want to have a business at all."

"What is this, your get rich quick scheme?"

"I do not think that a murderess has any call to pass judgement."

"What did you call me?"

"You helped kill Buzz Hackett and tried to murder your mother. And then poisoned me. And what do you care? You will still get your share of money if I keep the business going. You can do what you want, and Roger can do what he wants. And I will make sure that the money keeps coming."

"And profit from you."

"Little rich girl, you would not talk about money and profit so despectively if you ever had to do without."

Barnabas rises again, feeling the emptiness of the Old House. He wants to summon Maggie but is afraid of the emotions running ragged on him. He better go after cattle today, the way he is feeling. He knows that he cannot contain his rage when he feeds.

As he is about to leave, he finds Julia Hoffman on his doorstep. He lunges at her, but she has a cross, and he has to back down.

"Why do you come torment me?"

"One of Lang's experiments is running loose. I opened the cells where the experiments were... and he is out there. He already attacked a farmer."

"And.."

"And if they track down Lang's unusual experiments, they might find notes about vampires. And notes about you. I cannot find my notebook. I hope that it burned, but..."

"So..." "So we have to track down this experiment."

"And then what?"

"Then we'll see."


	37. Adam II

Barnabas agrees to look for the man that Julia says was one of Lang's experiments. He suspects that she expects him to kill the man.

"I am not Eric Lang" he mutters to himself.

He goes out and gorges on a cow, tearing it apart... He wonders what will the townspeople say when they see the remains... but since there won't be another incident for a while, he feels safe enough.

He goes over to the farm where the "misshapen creature" was seen, and tries to get a feel for whoever it is.

Joe Haskell is approached by the gunman who almost killed him.

"Don't worry, kid. This is another job. I mean you no harm."

Joe is wary, but the gunman reassures him.

"It was just a job, you understand. I now have another job, with a different boss. And this is something that you can do."

"No drugs."

"There are no drugs involved. It is something else."

David comes to the Old House an

d meets Julia. He asks her what she is looking for.

"I have business with Barnabas." "I know something about Barnabas that you don't." he tells her.

"And that is?"

"That you should leave here because he can be dangerous."

"I am dangerous, too."

Barnabas comes back and tells her that he has not seen the man yet.

"You expect me to kill him, don't you?"

"Well..."

"Killing was Lang's solution for everything."

"Well, you cannot let the authorities get hold of him."

"You are so coldblooded and ruthless, that I am tempting to let you treat me."

"Why, you think that I can cure you?"

"If you could you would die very soon. The one that put this curse on me does NOT want me released. Try to banish the curse, by any means, and Olajuwon will get rid of you..."

"Who is Olajuwon."

"Well, that is a long story..."

David comes in.

"Are you going to tell us your story, cousin Barnabas?"

Barnabas looks at him and sighs.

"Since you know so much, you might as well learn the rest... and thanks for helping."

"I should have done more. I could have made a bomb and..."

"Just as well that you did not."

Vicky writes to Professor Stokes, asking him about Burke point blank "Will he come back here, and when


	38. Adam III

Barnabas overhears that the cow that he tore apart is being blamed on the "misshapen creature" that attacked the farmer, and that they are starting to hunt for it. He decides to search for it in earnest, flying in bat form and covering as much ground as possible. He figures that if the creature is eating raw animals, there will be a blood scent that he can track.

Roger gives Vicky the power of attorney she asks for. "You will either straighten up the place or ruin us... I do not know what I'd prefer. But if means less work for me, I am all for it."

Carolyn sneers that Vicky is getting too ambitious.

"Would you rather run it, or is it against your radical beliefs?" asks Vicky who has little patience with Carolyn these days.

Barnabas finds the creature hiding under bushes. He sees that it is cold, and that there are wounds on him, not as if he was cut, but as if the skin is breaking.

There seem to be different patches of skin, some white, some black...Evidently whoever the experiment is, it involved one black man... and that's why Olajuwon allowed Lang to be killed...

He picks him up, as the creature is not a match for his strenght, and carries it to the Old House. It is a long walk as he cannot fly, and has to stay hidden.

When he finally gets there Julia is distraught.

"You mean you brought him here? What are we supposed to do with it?"

"Take care of him. And what do you mean by we?"

"But..."

"Miss Hoffman, I will, if for no other reason than not to risk Olajuwon wrath. The black man involved in this experiment was the reason he allowed Lang to be killed. So, I will take care of him properly."

"He is sick, he may die, anyway."

"So I will try to keep him comfortable."

"And you expect me to help, I imagine?"

"I do not remember asking you."

"I would like to stay... I lost everything. I have no career, I have no friends... I might as well stay with you and help you out."

Barnabas sighs. But he IS lonely with Willie away.

"All right, let's find a bed for him. And you can take a look and try to figure out how to help him.

"I am not a doctor"

"But you got experience with Lang, didn't you?"

"I cannot write prescriptions..."

"You are a biochemist. You can create your own drugs here, if you tell me what to get you."

Julia sighs. Well, she chose this...

Later, in the day, Joe goes to pick up the package that the gunman, Tom Jennings, asks him to pick. A long oblong box to get into Collinsport...


	39. Adam IV

Julia grumbles about taking care of the creature that Barnabas brought in, wondering if it is worth it.

"Of course, you expect me to cook for it."

"Him. And it cannot be that different from biochemistry."

"Still I do no see what the purpose is."

Barnabas leaves, wondering why it is important to him. He chooses his victim for the night, a young woman sleeping. As he bites, he is overwhelmed by her sadness and sense of guilt.

He asks her and finds out that she was Woodard's patient, the one that put him on Lang's trail. Now she blames herself for his death.

He is struck, as he misses the doctor and his talks greatly, and they end up weeping together.

Later, when he returns he tells Julia that the creature has to live.

"Why?" "Because I am tired of causing death even indirectly to those around me. I want this one to live, at least."

"As a compensation?

"If you wish."

Joe Haskell opens the box and out comes Angelique. But this Angelique is now a vampire, who bites him quickly, and puts him under her control.

"What do you want?" he asks.

"I want to hide." she says. "And leave before He comes for me again. You will help me do that."

Julia says that she does not know what is the matter with the creature. That Lang left no notes, and the information about that might be in an encrypted disk. She tells Barnabas to ask Maggietdo decrypt it, and to bring back the information that they need.

Barnabas goes back to the creature, looking at his scars and his mismatched skin.

"You must not have known much kindness.." he muses. "And I do not know how to help you."

"Why does he matter you?" Julia insists "You do not know him from Adam."

"Adam...yes, that's what I'll name him."

He adjusts the blanket around him "Sleep well, Adam."


	40. Angelique's return I

Angelique looks at the mirror, furious that she cannot see herself.

"Even that he took away from me." she says

"Who?" asks Joe

"Nicholas, my master. I have been his slave for over two hundred years."

"And where you...?"

"No, I was not a vampire then. He turned me into one as a punishment, for trying to run away."

"And you are running away from him again."

"Yes, he would not expect me to come back to this place with so many bad memories for me. But I WILL escape him."

Joe tries to leave the room but she summons him.

"I am hungry," she says, before biting him. Joe squirms but cannot fight her off.

"Will you kill me?" he asks.

"No. I will be discreet. No deaths, no violent attacks. Just erotic dreams and tiredness in the morning. But today I do not want to go out, and you are here."

She lets Joe go and gets back to watch the empty mirror. "How could I have lost so much?" she bemoans.

Vicky receives a letter from Professor Stokes, which is a stern one. He tells her not to be so insistent about Devlin. His probation will end at its proper time and not before. She must not forget that it was Devlin's doing that Peter Guthrie died, Devlin should count himself fortunate not to have been fired. But Professor Stokes is willing to come to Collinsport and look at the situation there, and whether it make sense for Devlin to return.

Julia meets Barnabas who is tending to Adam.

"Still I believe that it makes no sense" she says. "And why haven't you gone seen Willie"

"The smells of the hospital, and the emotions can overwhelm me and make me lose control... I know what I am capable of, Miss Hoffman, and what can trigger a violent attack of my part. I am not safe to be among patients."

"Of course, sometimes I forget..."

"I never do."

"I have been running tests on your blood.."

"Looking for a cure?"

"I think that I could neutralize the change in you."

"Maybe but you cannot test it on me."

"Why?"

"Because Olajuwon will kill you if there is a chance you might succeed.. Use me to run tests if you wish. But if you value your life, do not give me the cure."

Adam moans and rejects the broth that Barnabas was trying to feed him. "His situation does not improve."

"Maybe Maggie has made some progress." Julia says

Barnabas comes in as Maggie is concerned as to why Joe seems so unresponsive.

"I am tiredd, OK." Joe says. "I am not still over the wounds from last time."

Maggie sighs, but accepts this. She turns to Barnabas and tells him that she has decoded several files, but none yet to indicate that it was someone sewn up.

Outside, Angelique hears Barnabas' voice, she freezes.

"It cannot be him." she says to herself.

She looks into the window and sees him. He face contorts with hatred.

"This is all your fault." she says "I will make you pay."


	41. Angelique's return II

Angelique goes to Collinwood to see how Barnabas could have remained all these years. She spies Roger and Carolyn, and from their conversation she gets an idea of what is going on. Not much, but enough to tell her that these are the current Collinses. She waits until Carolyn leaves the room, and starts calling Roger in a soft voice.

Roger goes out, trying to find who is calling him and meets Angelique. She attacks him and puts him under her power.

"I am moving into Collinwood" she says. "And not by the servants entrance. I belong here, no matter what Joshua, or Naomi, or Abigail, or Jeremiah thought. I am not just the blonde slut of Barnabas, his to throw away when he felt like it."

She makes Roger help her move her coffin into Colliwood, and once there she stands by the window

"So, this is what looking out of the window at Collinwood is like. I was once not allowed to set foot in here. Well, no more. I have come to stay and claim my rightful place."

Jeff Clark gets a room at Collinsport. He finds out that Julia Hoffman is still in town, and is a bit worried because she is the only one who can recognize him. But, he reminds himself, she will not turn him in, because he has too many damning evidence about him. She would rather help him get away... or give him one of her "cocktails..." No, not if she knows that the evidnece against her will surface if he dies.

Still, it is better not to approach her. He still needs money. Why can he hit for it? Then he hears about Victoria Winters now running the cannery. She must have money. If he could get it out of her. But what can he offer? What does Victoria want, what does she like that he could sell to her? If he plays it well, he can set himself up...

In the meantime, he better start doing jobs at the dock, until that windfall comes.

Julia goes to the hospital to see Willie, who asks for Barnabas.

"He says that he cannot come because the hospital smells can make him lose control."

"I saw him lose control once. I still have nightmares."

"In any case, he says that when you get well, there is a lot of work for you to do."

"So he still wants his inn?"

"Yes, he still wants it."

Angelique calls unpon Roger, and after she feeds she asks him about the town and the family. She snickers to hear what the family has been reduced to, then asks him about Barnabas. All that Roger knows is that he showed up not too long ago, and that he is staying at the Old House free of charge while he renovates it. He is supposed to be the descendant of the Barnabas Collins that was expellled from Collinwood after the scandal with his uncle's wife.

"He is no descendant. He is the same one. And I will make him pay."


	42. Angelique's return III

Angelique sees the paints in Roger's room, and orders him to paint her portrait.

"I want to see my face again."

She ask him about Barnabas, but he cannot give him more information than the one she already has. She leaves to see Joe Haskell, who might know more.

As she is feeding off him, Maggie does come in, and is shocked to see the two in what looks like an embrace.

Angelique pulls away from Joe and Maggie recognizes her

"Angelique" she says.

Surprised, Angelique puts her under her power, and asks Maggie where have they known each other.

Maggie blurst out her memories of Phyllis Wick, and Angelique is surprised, but not too displeased.

"So this is the same Barnabas Collins I knew, the one who betrayed me"

"He's suffered too much."

"I have suffered and it is all his fault."

She asks if Barnabas is also a vampire, and Maggie agrees. She tells how the first attacks were violent and some of his victims ended up in the hospital, but then he learned how to do it with no troubles.

"Well, the troubles will start again."

She commands Maggie and Joe to forget about her, and she begins to make revenge plans.

Julia tells Barnabas that Willie will be released from the hospital in a couple of days, but that he should not strain himself for a few days.

Angelique calls upon Tom Jennings, the gunman who delivered her coffin to Joe Haskell. She begins feeding deeply and leaves him uncounscious.

"A couple more nights and you will be my weapon" she tells him.

"What you mean?"

"When you die from the loss of blood, you will become a vampire, too. Then I will unleash you on the town. And Barnabas will be blamed for it."


	43. Angelique's return IV

Angelique watches how Tom dies, and waits until he opens his eyes again.

"Welcome to the world of the undead, Mr. Jennings"

He gets up. "I am a vampire, just like you."

"Yes. Like me."

"So now I have your same powers and you cannot command me."

She gestures and freezes him. "I am a vampire but have also other powers. You must still obey me"

Tom groans.

"Now you will be my instrument of revenge against Barnabas Collins. Go feed and leave your victims groaning on the ground, weak, and likely to die of exposure."

"And then?"

"And then everything that will happen will happen."

Maggie has finished decoding Lang's file.

"I could not believe he could do that." she says. She puts the information in her bag and goes to see Barnabas.

As she walks down the path a bat swoops down on her.

Roger is painting Angelique, who asks him to describe her beauty in flattering terms.

"Could you believe that being as beautiful as I am someone rejected me for a blackhaired milksop?"

"He was a fool"

"And you are no fool. Yes, you are a most discerning man."

Outside David spies the two, until he hears Vicky calling for him, and runs back.

"What are you doing?"

"Watching father paint."

"Well, that seems OK. But it is late and you must sleep."

"Why must I sleep and father gets to stay late?"

"Because you are a kid."

Barnabas hears the distress call of Maggie and flies to her. He finds her on the ground, with a bleeding wound at the neck.

"Another one like me." he says.

Thanking Woodard for his first responder training, he stabilizes her long enough to bring her to the hospital. There is going to be questions later, he knows. And more victims found like Maggie...

Maggie wakes up and manages to give him the information she found out.


	44. Angelique's return V

Barnabas and Julia discuss what happened to Maggie.

"Someone like me, but who does not know how to control himself. I have to find him."

"Or her. And what will you do?"

"Talk him into being sensible. Or send him to you."

Julia sighs. "You want him to have the cure, or at least see if it works? "

"It would be a shame that you worked so hard for nothing."

Julia tells him of what Maggie decoded. It was an experiment in suppressing tissue rejection. Adam has been put together from thee different bodies, and treated so that those different tissues did not reject each other. The bodies were likely those of drifters, people that no one would miss.

"And Lang killed them for this experiment?"

"Yes.."

'He was a wicked man." Julia says that now she knows what ails Adam, and she can treat him. She cannot have the drugs, as they require prescriptions, but she can create them in her lab from different substances, all of them quite legal and over the counter..

David tells Carolyn about Rogere having a girlfriend in Collinwood. She poses for him, but then she kisses him. She is a beautiful blonde.

"And he told us nothing." Carolyn fumes.

Tom Jennings attacks another young villager, but is interrupted by Barnabas.

"Do not hurt her." he says.

"I have to."

"You have to feed. You do not have to hurt her."

"Oh, but I do, that is the whole point of it." he laughs.

"And there could be a cure for you, with Miss Hoffman."

Tom Jennings laughs again. "You do not undesrtand anything of what is going on, do you?" He releases the young woman and vanishes.

The next day Patterson calls upon Vicky about the attacks on Maggie and the other girl.

"I should have listened to him" he says, meaning Woodard. "He called me once to tell me that it had not ended, that there were new cases, but I was so mad because he had helped Haskell escape that I did not listen to what he had to say. And now he is dead..."

"And you think that he might have told me something?"

"He called me after that time you fainted.."

"I see." Vicky suspects that Barnabas might be losing control again, but she is constrained to protect him.

"He never told me anything about it... but... you rememer that he brought Peter Guthrie in?"

"Yes. A shame that he died, too."

"I can get the man who wokered closely with Gurthrie, Eliot Stokes. We have corresponeded. He can come look at it."

Patterson nods. "Yes, do that, please.

At night, Barnabas goes out to feed and to track Tom Jennings, but as soon as he is gone, Tom Jennings appears at the Old House and attacks Julia.

When Julia comes to, Tom Jennings tells her that he wants her cure.

"You want to be cured."

"Yes. I know how this game is being played, and I do not care to end up the fall guy. I want to get back to what is normal for me, and I want to get out of town before something hits the fan."


	45. Angelique's return VI

Julia gives Tom Jennings a shot, and he screams in pain saying that he is on fire. But then the pain subsides and nods when Julia says that he is the first one to try it.

"So I am to be the guinea pig...well, I did ask you. And if it works it will not matter. And if it doesn't it will matter even less."

He asks her to hide him during the day, and she takes her to the mausoleum, to a hidden room in it.

The next day Willie comes back, and Julia fills him in.

"You are going to have to help take care of Adam."

"Who is Adam?"

"Barnabas' latest project... I thought that he would die and that would be the end of it, but Barnabas insisted on healing him. So we are going to be responsible for him, even though he barely knows how to talk, and who knows what else is wrong with his mind."

She takes Willie to see Adam, who, after her treatment is looking better.

"So what am I supposed to do?"

"Feed him, talk to him. change his sheets..."

"And the... sanitary arrangements?"

"That too."

"I did not sign up for this"

"Neither did I, but we are stuck."

Carolyn spies on Roger while David follows her around, taking advantage that Vicky is too busy at the cannery to worry about him. She finally catches up with him, as Angelique comes to pose for her portrait.

"Why don't you introduce us to your girlfriend?" Carolyn asks, poisonously. "Why not bring your mistress openly now that mothers is gone? She is pretty, I grant you, but still to bring a.. hooker into he family home..."

Angelique turns to her, angrily. "What did you call me? Hooker? And before that it was 'that blonde strumpet' You always thought you were too good for the likes of me. I never could go into the house, unless it was by the servant's entrance. Barnabas could put me in a room, but should never dare to bring me to where his mother was You and your haughty Collins ways!"

She attacks Carolyn violently and drains her enough to leave her weak and in pain.

"That will teach you to talk to me with respect."

She takes Roger away, and leaves Carolyn moaning on the ground.

The sheriff comes to talk to Barnabas, and ask him if it was coincidence that it was him who found the two victims.

"No, it was not coincidence. After what happened to Maggie I was worried, and tried to trace back her steps, to see if there was something that I could find out."

"And Maggie..."

"She was coming to meet me. When she did not come I got worried and started looking for her."

"And why was she meeting you?"

"She was doing some work for me. Helping me with the paperwork for when I open the inn."

"I see...yes, perfectly understandable ... still, you were the one who we can place at both attacks."

"How about the other ones, the earlier ones?"

"Yeah, you are right. You were not here yet... still..."

Carolyn drags herself moaning until Vicky finds her.

"Barnabas is really getting out of control" Vicky muttes as she helps Carolyn, to get into the car.

David watches this, and goes to his room to put together a bomb...

Barnabas senses the distress from Vicky, and that she is thinkiing of him, not kindly. In spite of his misgivings about going to the hospital, he needs to know what is happening, and if it has to do with the new vampire he has confronted. He is met by a furious Vicky who bars his way with a cross.

"Vicky what is the matter!"

"I saw what you did to Carolyn"

"I have not touched Carolyn... there is another one of my kind... let me see her and you will know I am telling the truth."

Vicky is unwilling to let him in, but he uses her hold on her to make her give in. Carolyn does not respond to him, and seems even irritated by his presence.

Vicky recognizes that he is telling the truth and lowers her cross. Barnabas comes closer to Carolyn and asks her who did this to her. Carolyn says nothing, but starts muttering about Trenton.

"What happened in Trenton?"

"People died. We put a bomb there. It was supposed to be empty. Just as a statement... The way we put all those other bombs for the Cause... "

She confesses to have been a urban terrorist once, and only her family money and connections kept her out of jail.

"Now I do penance here, playing at being a dutiful daughter... Why are YOU doing penance, Cousin Barnabas?"


	46. Angelique's return VII

David finds Angelique's coffin and places his bomb on it.

"This is for Carolyn" he says.

Vicky is at the cafe, reviewing the resumes of the manager he wants to hire for the plan, when Jeff Clark approaches her, being very charming.

He talks her about the past, and history, and says that our knowledge of the past is incomplete. We have the papers and some artifacts, but do we really know how people thought in those times?

Vicky starts an animated conversation, telling him of ways to reconstruct the past and what people then thought and felt.

"And yet I found a way of going back" Clark says. "Really going back."

Julia leaves Willie in charge of Adam, who grumbles that he did NOT sign up of this, and he is brusque with Adam to show how much he dislikes it.

Julia goes to the secret room in the mausoleum, and finds Tom Jennings awake.

"It seems that your serum is working. I still crave blood, but not so much."

Julia gives him his shot, and Jennings tells his story. He is a werewolf, and he got tired of locking himself up during the full moon, or finding wildlife preserves to hunt.

"So I got this wizard to give me this medallion to channel my urges. I still got to kill, but that is my job, anyway. Unfortunately this wizard then got power over me, and he passed me on to his other slave, the vampire...and well, here I am.."

Roger finds the bomb on Angelique's coffin and dismantles it.

"Oh, David, I am really going to send you away, now that Liz is gone. I do not care for the scandal."

Joe brings his boat to a secluded cove, and puts up the signal. As he waits for his contact to show up he hears the words "Police! Hands up!"

Patterson arrests Joe, telling him that he no longer has the doc run interference for him.

Angelique summons Roger, and as she feeds from him, he senses that there is a story about David. She makes him tell. When she does her eyes blaze.

"I will make him pay!"


	47. Angelique's return VIII

Angelique chases David who runs screaming for his life. Angelique plays cat and mouse with him, amusing herself by his fear. She is about to catch him when Barnabas shows up and puts himself between her and David.

"You!" he exclaims.

"It is all your fault. You ruined me. You reduced me to this!"

"You destroyed my family!"

They trade reproaches for a while until Barnabas hears David's whimper. He scoops him up and faces Angelique once more.. "I will not let you destroy my family again."

He takes David to the Old House, while David lets him know what he found out.

"So she is in Collinwood, playing at being the mistress... and she is like me, too.. But why does she blame me for it?"

He tells Willie to find a bed for David, and tells Julia what he found out. Julia comes up with the suggestion that he go the room that Josette opened for him. It might have something there to help him.

Barnabas goes to the room, while Julia sneaks out to meet Tom Jennings, who is running up a fever.

"I feel I am changing... I am very close... it hurts, but it is good.."

Barnabas enters the room, asking for guidance and wondering if Josette will come. He hears a tinkling sound and finds a white alabaster box that calls to him.

"Take it outside and open it" he hears Josette's voice.

He does so, and from the box rises a mighty wind that tears through the trees.

Angelique is caught by the wind, and tries to fight it, but is dragged along.

Tom Jennings feels the wind, but can hold on to the walls.

"I am changing just in time." he says. "It could drag me now if I wasn't human again. I do not know what trouble Angelique is now, but I am glad not to be part of it again."

Angelique is dragged towards the box, as she struggles and screams. The wind pushes her inside the box until Barnabas closes the lid, and the wind dies down. Barnabas takes the box back into the room and leaves it there.

As he leaves he sees a car that has crashed into a tree, driven by the wind. He extricates the driver, and after he has fed off the spilled blood, he takes him to the hospital, where the man is identified as Professor Eliot Stokes.


	48. Tony Peterson I

Julia tells Barnabas of Tom Jennings, and that he is leaving town.

"I guess he was just another victim" he says "I wish him godspeed".

He tells Vicky that the threat is over and that there will be no more attacks.

"But Professor Stokes is here" she says. "He is coming to investigate"

"Well, talk to him at the hospital. Maybe you can blame it all on Laura again."

Joe Haskell talks to his lawyer, Tony Peterson, showing him Julia's notebook, saying that he should ask Barnabas and Julia for help. That Barnabas has enough power to get the charges against him dismissed.

Tony is delighted to have some disresputable information against the high and mighty Collins family.

Vicky goes to see Stokes at the hospital

"What do you know about the local vampire?" Stokes asks.

"Vampire?"

"He drank the blood I had spilled. I do not begrudge it, as it was going to waste. And he did save me. But I think you know him."

"He had nothing to do with the attacks. He did stop them. It was this woman that has a grudge against him..."

"Would the vampire be Barnabas Collins?"

Vicky freezes.

"Come on, I read what my ancestor wrote about him. He did not use the words but I can read between the lines. And the woman who has grudge against him would be his former mistress, Angelique."

"Yes."

"Well, you found a most interesting place to do your historical research in."

"Yes... you know that the period between Independence and the writing of the Constitution is not very much studied."

"And Barnabas Collins was a witness to some of the events... yes, I can see that you got into a symbiotic relationship with him. He gets the blood, and you get the info.."

"He's no threat..."

"I can surmise it by the fact that he pulled me out of the car and took me to the hospital... well, I will see what to tell Sheriff Patterson."

"You can blame it on Laura."

"Energy seepage from her altar? Yes, I can talk into some technobabble, and he will be satified, as long as there are no more attacks."

Tony Peterson approaches Julia, telling her that he has her notebook, and that he expects her and Barnabas to get Joe free of all charges.


	49. Tony Peterson II

Vicky meets with Jeff Clark who teaches her meditation techniques that allow her to "see" scenes from the past. She in entranced by it, but then the vision fades.

"You need to work more at it" he tells her.

The Sheriff meets Stokes at the hospital, who shoots at him questions about the altar where Laura planned her sacrifice, and if there was any sealing of it done.

"Sealing?" Patterson asks.

Stokes sighs. "You do not know that you are supposed to seal those sites, or things can come through them? It needs to be done, or you will get worse. Tell the hospital to release me, and I will do it. I hope that nothing worse comes out of it."

Willie is tending to Adam who grabs things. Willie tries to pull some of it away, angering Adam.

"Mine! mine!" He shouts.

He chases Willie who runs.

Fortunately Julia is there who conks Adam on the head.

"We cannot allow him to run loose." she says. "Go find a chain."

"But Barnabas..." "When Barnabas is awake he is strong enough to control him. We are not. And he needs to learn impulse control"

Joe is sleeping in his cell. It is a bad dream. He sees the gunmen who tried to kill him and Maggie.

"This time the vampire will not come to your help." the men say. "You will see Maggie die, and it will have been your fault"

He runs from them and comes across a sealed door. He beats at it, knowing that once he opens it he will be free... He tries to undo the lock , to break it..."

He awakens when he falls off his cot.

Barnabas talks to Carolyn, reasoning that with her experience,, she can tell them how to retrieve Julia's notebook. Carolyn laughs when Barnabas says that the notebook has information about him.

"It is not about you, cousin. It is about her. You can bet that the deal her lawyer got for her did not include the more serious felonies she committed for Lang. And that notebook has evidence that can send her to jail for a long time... I know, cousin. The deal my lawyer got did not include the killings in Trenton, nor other things... Well, I am willing to help. I will go to see Mr. Peterson, and case his joint. Call it a favor from one felon to another."


	50. Tony Peterson III

Carolyn comes to Tony Peterson's office to ask his advice on how to contest the agreement that her mother made with her. She paints Elizabeth as unreasonable in her demands, spcially now that she has left and abandoned her duties. She also asks if the power of attorney that Roger made with Vicky can be broken. She is at her most charming and seductive, while at the same time checking where everything is: the file, the safe, the security cameras, and the locks. She takes advantage of his leaving the office for a few moments to snap photos with her cell phone. Having cased the joint, she formulates a plan to break in and steal the notebook.

Tony Peterson seems taken by her charm, but looks at her suspiciously as she leaves.

As night comes, Joe Haskell dreams again. Again the gangsters chase him, and again they blame him for Maggie's death. He comes to the doors and beats on it. This time the door gives in, and it opens.

Behind the door is Vicky. "I will take it over from you, now" she says.

Joe Haskell wakes up and feels better.

Barnabas and Carolyn meet outside of Peterson's office. Carolyn is in full ninja gear, and is disappointed that Barnabas says that he will hypnotize the security guard, instead of having her scale the walls

"You are no fun, Cousin Barnabas."

They get in, with Carolyn using the photos she took to fool the security cameras.

The locks are easy to force open, and once inside Carolyn looks into the files under Haskell. Inside there is a package which looks like it holds the notebook. Carolyn opens it an finds it to be a bundle of newspapers, with a an envelope inside it, addressed to her. She opens it

"It is not in the safe either, so don't bother forcing it open. If you are still interested, meet me for lunch, and we'll discuss terms."

Stokes talks to Vicky, and asks her all she knows about Barnabas. They talk about the past, and wouldn't it be great to be THERE and see it.

Stokes cautions her about losing her perspective and forgetting that she is merely to record, not relive it.

"The past can be an obsession, and like all obsessions can be dangerous."

Still, Vicky insists, if there was a way...

"I would be very careful not to get too caught up in what went on. You might not be able to get back."

Carolyn meets with Tony Peterson who tells her that he knew from the first moment what she was after.

"After all, Haskell has information about one of your family, so I could expect you to protect that errant member... And you have acquired certain skills from your lawbreaking days... I could see you casing the joint, and when I left I spied you taking photos."

"And now?"

"Now my terms are these: One, you come work for me as an investigator. I think that you'll enjoy it more than being a dutiful daughter. And you look very fetching in ninja gear. "

"What are your other terms?"

"Your cousin puts the DA under his influence. I know what your cousin can do - Haskell told me. The DA will give Haskell the best deal possible, and make him think it is his idea... Yeah, Haskell will do time, but not for long, and might yet get off on good behavior. I will convince Haskell that it is the best he can hope for."

Carolyn agrees to both, and they toast their future partnership.


	51. Vicky's trip to the past I

Barnabas meets the DA and puts him in his power. Then Tony Peterson comes and drives a deal with him, with Barnabas watching.

Joe will still have to do jail time, but not too long, and he will provide the authorities with information about the drug smuggling ring.

Barnabas asks Peterson why he didn't ask for more.

"Because it is a deal that he can accept, and actually believe he came up with the idea. Make him agree to a deal he is not comfortable with, and will start questioning it... It is a question of knowing when to stop."

'Joe and Maggie will not like it."

"This is the best they can get. And going to jail WILL impress on Joe that smuggling is a bad idea. And Maggie will like that."

'Yes, I can see that."

Vicky dreams. She is tied up and Matthew Morgan is looming over her. He is digging the grave for her.

"You had to ask questions, you had to poke into what is not your business."

He picks her up and throws her in, and begins shoveling earth over her. Then she is up and running with Matthew chasing her. He gains on her, as she comes upon a locked door. If she can open it, she will be free. She tears at the locks, but they resist, and Matthew comes closer...

She wakes up screaming.

Tony and Carolyn have lunch.

"I have looked into the agreement you made with your mother. She can enforce it, but she is not here. And the responsibility devolves upon your uncle Roger. I think that he might be willing to see reason, if there is money in for him. I will have him sign the papers, so that when your mother comes back, she will not be able to fight it."

Impulsively Carolyn kisses him.

"Watch out, kid, or you'll fall in love with me."

"Is it real? Can I have a new life?"

"Yes."

"But do I deserve it?"

Willie throws food at Adam who is lunging for him.

Julia reproves him.

"I am not getting closer to him. He wants to kill me. I just hope that the chain holds."

"Barnabas can handle him."

"Well, Barnabas is out of it and we are the ones we have to handle him. If he was to break the chain and run away..."

"We could try to get him sedated during the day."

"Can you get him sedatives?"

"These are prescriptions drugs..."

"Well, there is always booze."

They are interrupted by the arrival of Professor Stokes who tells them that the police are satisified that the altar taht Laura used has been properly sealed, and that Barnabas needs not worry, that altar is taking the blame for the vampire attacks.

"Of course, I know what and who Baranbas is. I would like some day to have him tell me about my ancestor."

Vicky meets with Jeff, and wonders if her bad dreams are the result of the meditation techniques he taught her.

"You go into the past. Not the past, but your own personal past. You are supposed to visit your past incarnations. And you are going to run across distressing moments. Were you reliving a distressing moment of your recent past?"

"Yes."

"Then you have to deal with it. Be stronger. When you can surmount this bad memory, you can go look into distressing moments of your past lives."

Vicky nods.

"I can give you some incense to help you do this." he says.

This sample will be free. When she starts going into the past, then he will sell it to her. There is plenty of money to be made off this drug.

Vicky goes to bed and dreams.

Again Matthew Morgan is dragging her towards he opened grave.

"You did not have to look. You did not have to ask. Why not leave it alone? Now, you will pay."

She runs from him and is stopped by the locked door. She suddenly has a gun and shoots the locks. She pushes the door open. Inside she finds Carolyn

"I will take over now." Carolyn says.


	52. Vicky's trip to the past II

Vicky talks again to Jeff, certain now that she can face to any distressing events in her past lives. She tells him that the incense he gave her did help. He says that he ran out, but that he can buy more. She offers to pay for it. He looks reluctant, but then accepts her money. He says that price may vary, and not to use too much (certain that she will)

Adam lunges at Willie, and breaks the chain.

He chases Willie shouting "Mine, Mine... Give, Give!"

Julia tries to hit him over the head, but he turns around, grabs her and throws her against the wall. Willie runs out, with Adam after him. They race among the bushes.

Carolyn is attracted by the noise and goes to investigate. Adam crashes into her. He stares at her, curious to see someone who is not Barnabas nor Julia nor Willie.

Carolyn screams, wishing that she had a gun, and runs.

She runs across

Professor Stokes who has also been attracted by the conmotion.. He hits Adam with his cane, and then grabs his throat. "Now, for the Vulcan nerve pinch" he says, as Adam collapses.

Willie turns to him.

"We have to get him back. Barnabas does not want anything to happen to him."

"Barnabas, mmm? Well, you can tell me the whole story when we bring him back."

Vicky burns some of the incense as she meditates. She begins to see the interior of a shop...and a man who looks like Jeff.. He is saying something, but she cannot hear it... Then the vision vanishes...

"I may need more incense." she tells herself.

Stokes gets the whole story from Julia.

"So, he is another of Lang's experiments... Well, it was very noble of Barnabas to be responsible for him, but he did not think it through. Adam is just a big baby, with a baby's needs, and a baby's total lack of concern for other people. Only that instead of being small, cute, and helpless, he is big, ugly, and powerful... But he can be taught... Reward and punishment. More reward than punishment. If he wants something, give it to him only after he does one thing that he should do. Small things at first, but once he knows that he does not get food until he is sitting down, he will sit down each time you go to feed him. And so on. Bit by bit. I would like to take over his education later on, and I will make arrangements. But you can start training him now."

At night, Carolyn dreams. She is about to meet Peterson to start her job, and then she is bumped by the ugly man she bumped into.

"I am ugly, am I now? Not as ugly as someone killed by a bomb...I died that day. It was your bomb. And you have no right to be happy. You will never be forgiven."

Carolyn screams and runs away. "No more! I paid for it! Leave me alone!"

She comes across the locked door, and fights to open it, sure that if she does, she will escape her past... But she cannot open it, and the man comes closer...

She wakes up screaming.


	53. Vicky's trip to the past III

Stokes talks to Barnabas about "your problem in the cellar"

He says that he might be able to find a place for Adam where he can be taught and trained for a job, along with everything else that he needs to know. Plus some plastic surgery so that he looks less "bizarre".

"I guess that by using different skin colors Lang though he was providing irrefutable proof."

"Lang was a wicked man."

"Yes. A brilliant mind, but wicked."

He asks Barnabas about his ancestor, Ben.

Barnabas tells what he knows.

"But then I was locked up, and I do not know what became of him. Evidenly he married, had children, and prospered enough so that one of his descendants is a Professor."

"It was not easy for him, but yes, he did."

"He was going to marry Phyllis Wick, but I believe that she was killed."

"Lynched. American popular justice. The reason why I do not think that The People are that wise, nor that good, as some people say."

They go on for a while.

The next day, Maggie talks to Joe, who says that he finally understood what harm he was doing to her by his smuggling.

"I thought it was easy money, but I nearly got you killed. "

Maggie nods, hoping that this attitude will take and will not be tempted to go back to it once he is released from prison.

"I still got to do time, my lawyer says. and, you know... I think that I deserve it."

They talk a while, and Joe does mention the dream. "And the door opened once I promised myself not to smuggle ever again."

"Well, I understand that you use dreams to resolve questions that plague you during the day."

"But why would Vicky be there?"

"Why not?"

Carolyn fills a glass of brandy and nurses it.

"Drinking this early? You are not me, you know." Roger says.

"Yours is a different set of problems. And I believe that you have got a second chance."

"Yes. I do, uncle, but..."

"But?"

"But do I deserve it?"

"Ah, does anyone deserve what we get?"

"I AM a murderess, Uncle."

"So am I."

"And what right do I have to be happy?"

"Right? Just take what you are given, and be thankful. Remember what that wise old Jewish man said when he received an award. "I do not deserve this, but I got arthritis, and I do not deserve it either... Or think. Treat us after our deserts, and who will escape whipping?"

"So?"

"So if you got a chance, seize it. Your suffering will not make anything right. But your happiness might give you power to help others."

Carolyn nods and goes back to her brandy.

Vicky buys more incense from Clark. The price was a bit higher than last time, but she is willing to pay.

Carolyn goes to bed and dreams. Again she is chased by the malformed Adam who calls her a murderess.

"You do not deserve happiness!" he shouts at her.

She runs until she comes to the locked door

"You do not deserve happiness!"

"No, but I will seize it anyway!" she shouts.

And with this the door opens.

She finds Willie there. "I will take it up from here."


	54. Vicky's trip to the past IV

Early in the morning, Vicky writes what she remembers of her vision.

She was married to a Peter Bradford, back in 1785...She did live in Collinsport, and she had Peter Bradford had a shop. Peter was a cruel man, who was harsh with her. And he did keep secrets...

She writes all the details from the time that she remembers, the furniture, the clothing, the food, what was talked about in town...

She also notes how much incense she bought from Clark, and makes a note to buy more, as it is being very effective.

Willie talks to Julia, asking her if she wants to stay once the inn is finished, or if she has another plans

"No other plans. My career as a biochemist is over, and I could not go anywhere without the news of my disgrace following me."

"So you are going to work at the inn?"

"I suppose I must."

Willie sighs. "And hope that you get another case to treat."

"Well, Lang did several experiments. I think that we will be hearing from them."

"Yeah... you know, now that Adam has calmed down, I think that we may be approaching normalcy. Or as normal as you can be when we work for a vampire."

Carolyn meets with Tony and tells him that she is ready to start work for him. He is pleased, and gives her her first case. Track some records at the archives.

"Only that?" she seems disappointed

"Well, it saves me from doing it, but I want you not just to find them, but to read them, and try to understand them. And figure out what other documents we might need to find out."

Willie goes downtown to the hardware store and he sees Clark as he talks to Vicky. He recalls the man. He was there where Lang shot him and Woodard... And he is back... and, and what is he doing with Vicky?

He should tell Barnabas.. but what would Barnabas do? He remembers what Barnabas did to Jason... He does not want to see THAT again.

He does tell Julia who agrees that is better that Barnabas do not know. She may go to meet Clark and convince him to leave town.

At night Willie dreams. He hears Jason's voice, as wet and squishy footsteps come up the stairs. "You are dead!" he shouts. The dismembered body of Jason comes out and laughts at him.

"You let him do this to me." Jason says.

"You were hurting me!"

"And now I will hurt you again, to make you pay."

Willie runs followed by Jason, who keeps falling apart and putting himself together again. Willie reaches a door and tries to open it, but it does not give, and Jason is coming closer...

Willie wakes up screaming.


	55. Vicky's trip to the past V

The next morning Vicky fails to wake up.

After trying unsuccessfully to rouse her, Carolyn has her taken to the hospital. She then goes over her notes to discover what could have caused it.

She talks to Professor Stokes who says that Vicky was doing a dangerous experiment in trying to relive a past incarnation, and might be stuck at a particularly painful moment there. He tells her to check on the historical records for the name "Peter Bradford" because it might explain why she is unresponsive.

He then goes to the Old House to confer with Julia and Willie regarding any possible help by Barnabas.

"It happened in 1785, and if he was not locked up in the coffin yet, he might be able to send his mind back to his previous body and stop whatever it is that is causing this to Vicky."

Julia and Willie check the notes and Julia pales when she sees Jeff Clark's name.

"He used to be Lang's flunky. And he might have access to some of Lang's drugs... Investigating past incarnation is something that Lang would do."

"He is in town." Willie says. "I did not want to say nothing because I did not want Barnabas do to him what..."

"What he did to Jeremiah and Abigail" Stokes ends.

"Yeah."

Carolyn comes back with what she could dig out at the Archives.

Peter Bradford was hanged for the murder of his wife, Ellie, throwing her off Widow's Hill.

"If Victoria was Ellie, when did she die?"

When Carolyn tells him, he figures out that Barnabas was not yet locked in the coffin, and so they can ask him for help.

They confront Jeff Clark, who insists that he senses that he and Vicky knew each other in a past life, that they might even have been in love. He has gone back to his own previous incarnation, and has seen her with him.

"What was your name then?" Carolyn asks

"Peter Bradford."

"Well, you murdered her and were hanged for it."

Jeff tries to tough it out, but they are not having any.

"Tell us everything you know."

"Or.."

"Or I will tell Barnabas that you were helping Lang when he shot me and the Doc. You do not want to know what he can do to you."

Jeff capitulates and tells everything he knew, including his participation in Lang's experiment into past incarnations.

"And you thought to sell it to Vicky"

"She wanted to know more about the past. And it helped her."

He is told to leave town, that very day, because if he stays longer, Barnabas will be told about him.

"And don't let the door hit your ass on your way out." Carolyn says to him.

At night, when Barnabas rises, he is told what happened and that there might be a way to save Vicky, if he is willing.

He is willing and sits at the table while Stokes begins to burn the incense. He tells Barnabas the date that he should aim for, and when he gets there, he must find Ellie Bradford

"You will sense her, because she is Victoria, and you have enough of a link to her to recognize her vibrations"

Barnabas closes his eyes and goes into a trance.


	56. Vicky's trip to the past VI

Barnabas feels himself pulled back and walks through a fog.

The fog dissipates and he finds himself on the docks, and near him is Ruby Tate.

This is the day that he tried to feed off her, and she fell in the water and drowned... He feels the rage and pain of his former self. Rage and pain that scream to go out.

He forces himself to calm down and approaches Ruby He holds her with his eyes, and as he calms himself down, he makes himself send calming thought to her. He bites her and feeds, making sure to keep sending calming thoughts.

He releases her and tells her to leave Collinsport and make a new life for herself. He gives her the money in his pockets and watches her go.

At least one harm has been undone.

He tries to find the vibrations from Vicky or Ellie Bradford. He has the address of the Bradford shop and he flies there.

He gest to watch Ellie screaming and fighting off Peter. She escapes him and runs. He follows them.

"You looked didn't you?" Peter shouts at her. "I told you to leave it alone, but no, you had to look!"

She runs towards Widow's Hill and Peter smiles. "Yeah, go there." He grabs her and pulls her towards the edge. "Let me go... I will not tell."

"You always had a big mouth. And never did what you were told. I thought I had beat it out of you, but you are hopeless. Now you WILL say nothing."

He is dragging her towards Widow's Hill when Barnabas appears in front of him. He grabs Ellie from him and throws her a distance away, as he feels the blood rage mount in him. He then pulls Peter Bradford to himself, and begins tearing him apart and feasting on his blood. The pain and rage of his formers self finally break through.. better him than Ruby Tate, he thinks in the back of his head..

Ellie runs away screaming.

Barnabas stands over the dismemebered corpse of Bradford. Ellie will live. And, he hopes, Vicky will awaken.

He feels himself being pulled away again, back in the fog...

And then he is sitting next to Professor Stokes. "Did it work?" he asks.

Stokes calls Carolyn on his cell and Carolyn says that Vicky she's awake, and has said some nonsense about a breathing box...

"It worked." Stokes reassures Barnabas.

Barnabas walks around and sees a picture on his wall. "Willie," he asks. "Did you change this picture?" "No, it is the same one I got from the attic." "And yet... didn't it use to be a still life?" "No.. it was always this portrait.." Barnabas looks at the signature: Charles Delaware Tate...

Ruby did not die, he realized, and her son could make a life for himself, and could afford art lessons for HIS son...

And he is now the only one who remembers that there used to be a still life. Where is it? Probably in the attic still...


	57. The Dream Curse I

Willie is relieved that Vicky is OK, and goes to sleep.

In his dream he is chased again by Jason, but he feels calmer about it. He finds the door, and notices that it is easy to unlock.

"It was your fault, Jason" he says, as he opens the door.

Behind the door he finds Roger "I will take it up from here." he says.

In the meantime Barnabas and Stokes about what happened to Vicky.

"She went back to a previous incarnation."

"Is that possible?"

"With the proper drugs it is."

"Where could she have found them?"

"There are those who sell them. They are drugs that create addiction, because going to the past can be fascinating to certan people. And that's when the prices go up."

Stokes says that he will give Vicky a dressing down so that she does not try that again.

Barnabas talks about changing the past. He wonders what happned to Ellie aftewards. He does tell of Ruby Tate, and how he changed her fate.

"I hope that you will not become the next addict to this drug. One addiction is enough for you."

"I am not addicted..."

"To blood.."

"It is not an addiction."

"But it makes life harder for you and for everyone else. I know that you minimize the damage, but still, there is a potential for great harm there."

"I am aware of that."

"Well, I would not like to think what would happen if we added a drug addcition to that."

In the morning Carolyn goest to the coffee shop where Maggie is working. She is quite cordial to Maggie, who is surprised by Carolyn's attitude, as she is usually morose and generally unpleasant.

She canot help herself and comments on it.

"I have a new outlook in life. I can have a better life and I am going to get it... On, Maggie, do you know what it is like to beat yourself against a locked door, and then to realize that it is open and you can get out?"

"Joe said something to me about that."

"I am sorry about Joe."

"And yet, if what he says is true, if he opened that door, it might the best thing that happened to him."

Stokes speaks sternly to Vicky telling her not to do those experiments on her own. The kind of trip that she went requires considerable mental discipline, which she lacks at this point.

Vicky is properly chastened, but then asked what happened to Ellie.

Stokes says that after Peter's death she inherited the shop, sold it, and moved away from Collinsport.

"They did not blame her, then for his death?"

"The way the body was torn up? No, they had a mad killer on the loose, and they could see that she was not him."

Roger stays up late, trying to decide how to react to Carolyn's new life. He cannot help feeling envy. It it was not so late for him...

He dozes and falls asleep. He dreams of Burke Devlin, and a faceless, blood spattered man who face him.

"We know what you are." they say. "You are nothing. You are a lousy businessman, and a lousy artist. You are a failure as a husband and father. They only thing you succeeded in doing was killing someone."

"No!"

"You are a murderer, Roger Collins. and a failure. A miseralbe failure."

Roger runs from them, but is stopped by a locked door. He struggles to open it, while Devlin and the man he ran over laugh at him...

Roger wakes up screaming.


	58. The Dream Curse II

Stokes talks to Julia about Adam. He promises to make arrangements to have him move to better surroundings.

Julia is impatient to have him out, same as Willie.

"I can arrange something, but it will take a few weeks."

Julia is concerned about Adam's development. He is now a well behaved child. But his hormones are not of a child.

"He has gotten cuirous about sex." Julia says. "I try not to be alone with him."

"Yes, he is going through an accelerated puberty."

"Why can't you take him today?"

"He needs secure arrangements, as you must be aware, until he learns self-control."

"And in the meantime he stays here."

"You seem to be doing a good job up to now."

Stokes goes down to the cellar and talks to Adam, who is learning to read.

Adam points at the picture of children playing in a garden.

"Pretty" he says. "Here it is not pretty."

"You will have gardens, too Adam."

"Now!"

"Adam, you must learn patience."

"Patience means No, doesn't it?"

"Patience means later."

"I hate it here! I hate Willie!"

"Poor Willie, he is doing the best he can." "Julia is...different. She smells different.."

Stokes sighs. Yes, he better finalize the arrangements. And yet, the development of this mind is something that he does not want to miss. If he turned him over to the experts, he would miss it... He will finalize the arrangements later, not now...

Maggie goes to see Vicky at the hospital

"I see that you are recovering nicely.."

"Yes. I did something very foolish."

"We all do, at some time or another."

"I learned that just because you finally managed to open a door, it does not mean that it is safe to go through it. Some things are better left alone."

Maggie nods.

Vicky says that she realizes that she is being overextended. What with the responsabilities of the cannery, and dealing with David, on top of her research, it is a miracle that she has not collapsed yet. She is going to hire a manager for the cannery, and concetrate on dealing with David, who needs extra attention these days.

They talk of other things, with Vicky commiserating on Joe going away to jail.

"Still it might be for the best if this makes him stop taking chances with seedy types." she says, and Maggie agrees.

Roger sits morosely in the drawig room with brady in his hand. Carolyn comes breezing in, all gung-ho from doing research for Tony. "

What is the matter, uncle?"

"I am a failure. I will always be a failure."

"You are not."

"I failed at everything."

"You were doing the wrong things. Not doing what you are good for, but what Mother wanted."

"I am not good as an artist."

"I do not think so. You are a bit rough but that can be cured with practice."

"I don't have the heart for it."

"Why not?"

"Becasue I do not deserve it. Not with what I have done."

"Uncle, what did you tell me the other day of not passing opportunities becasue you think you do not deserve them? I did not deserve this new life I have a chance for, but I am seizing it. Seize your chance, too.".

At night, he goes to bed, and again he sees Burke Devlin and the man he ran over with his car.

They mock him as he goes to the door.

"Failure! Failure!" they shout at him.

He says nothing and turns the knob. "I do not deserve it\, but I will seize it anyway" he says.

The door opens and he finds Maggie there "I will take it up from here."


	59. The Dream Curse III

Vicky leaves the hospital, and calls Christopher Jennings for an interview as the plant manager.

Roger goes to Sam Evans and tells him that he is ready to start painting in earnest again.

"I do not know if I am good or not, but I will never find out if I do not try."

They talk a bit, and Roger says

"I decided to open the door, and that was it. It taught me that it does not matter what other people think"

Maggie listens to this, curious... Is it her imagination, or people are talking about doors too much?

At night, Vicky goest to Barnabas to thank him for rescuing her. As he feeds from her, she tells him that she did not realize how much it hurt him to retell his story to her.

"I was looking at it from the outside, I did not live it. But for you, it was scratching open the wounds. I had to live it myself to know what it felt. I am deeply sorry."

After he pulls away from her neck, he tells her that he allowed it because he liked the convenience of not having to go out to feed.

"Home delivery, I think it is called. We both allowed it to go on too long."

She promises him that she will stick to documents in her research, and of course, oral history, having people tell the stories that they heard from their grandparents. "Telling what you granny told you is never painful."

Maggie goes to sleep.

She sees herself as Phyllis Wick again, and Reverend Trask is leading the lynch mob to her.

"Hang the Papist! Kill her and cleanse the town! "No Popery here!"

She runs but they gain on her. She reaches a door. If she opens it, she will be safe. She struggles with the knob, but it will not open...

She wakes up screaming.


	60. The Dream Curse IV

Maggie is disturbed by her dream, and cannot get it out of her mind. It is too familiar... She remembers what Joe told him about Vicky being in his dream, and approaches her.

"Maybe I am giving too much importance to a dream, but there are too many coincidences, too many people talking about opening doors, and doors in dreams."

"You too dreamed of doors?" Vicky asks "I dreamed of it, and after that I tried that incense that put me in a coma."

"Joe had a similar one. And I think that Carolyn did, too. And maybe Roger.."

Vicky nods, and says that as soon as she is done interviewing Jennings she will talk to Roger and Carolyn.

"Jennings" Maggie's face darkens. "Jennings was the gunman who tried to kill Joe and me."

"He is probably not the same one. At most a distant relative."

"Let's hope so."

Maggie asks Vicky to tell Professor Stokes to move Adam away.

"I think that he likes to have Adam all to himself for his research. But we are going to be opening the inn soon, and I do not want him there. He would scare the customers away."

Vicky promises to talk to the Professor.

Stokes talks to Burke Devlin, saying that he got a good report from him.

"Maybe you can come here. I think that Miss Winters will be glad to see you again. But you got to finish your current assignment."

Vicky interviews Christopher Jennings, and is surprised that a man with his qualifications wants to bury himself in a one-horse town.

"I like the wilderness, and the solitude."

"Are you an outdoorsman?"

"As far as I can do it. But I will never let my work nor my punctuality suffer from that. It is just that after I leave in the evening I may be difficult to contact."

"Not even with a cell phone?"

"I leave my cell phone behind when I go."

Vicky hires him and gives him all the information to start working.

At night Maggie dreams again. She is again chased by Trask and the lynching mob. She comes to the door that will not open. And yet... She turns to the mob and says

"You are the past. You are gone. This is my future. I will go to it."

The door opens, and she finds Julia.

"I will take it from here." Julia says.


	61. The Dream Curse V

Carolyn and Vicky talk to Maggie. They say that several people have dreamed of a door that could not open, but on the second night it did. They also say that they find a pattern that the person behind the door is the next one to dream. Vicky says that she called Stokes, who is out of town at the moment, to give his opinion.

"I would think that this is a benign phenomenon" Carolyn says, "as it gives us courage to do what needs to be done."

"Except that it almost got me killed" Vicky says.

"The next person should be Miss Hoffman." Maggie says

"Should we tell her?' Vicky asks

"Tell her what? That she is going to dream of a door?" Carolyn says scornfully. "We are not that close and she will just think we are loopy. No, better let her dream the first night, when she still does not open the door, and then, with Stokes, we will confront her. Still I do not think it to be dangerous."

"It is strange, it is supernatural. We better assume it is dangerous." Vicky insists.

"Well, we wait for Stokes, then" Maggie says.

At night Julia goes to sleep. She is back at Wyncliffe, roaming all alone the rooms.

"How many have died here, Julia?" he hears a voice. "How many did you kill for Lang?"

She screams as the walls drip blood.

"You betrayed your calling. You were supposed to use science to help your fellow man. Instead you used it for self-aggrandizement. And you killed for it."

(And here comes the famous Grayson Solo...)

He turns and sees Dave Woodard in front of her. "Time to pay, now, Julia."

She runs to a closed door, which refuses to open, no matter how she struggles.

"NO! NO!"

Julia wakes ups screaming, which brings both Willie and Barnabas to her.

"He wants me to die!" she say, shaking. "He says I must pay!


	62. The Dream Curse VI

Julia is so upset, so sure that Woodard wants her to die, that Barnabas decides to summon Woodard's spirit to see if he can be appeased.

When Woodard shows up, he says "It is an enemy doing this. She must NOT open the door."

Barnabas asks about Julia "She has to deal with what she has done. But not by me."

He reminds Barnabas of what he has to be for the town "They feed you, and you protect them."

Carolyn hangs up the phone, upset. "Mother is coming back" she says to Roger.

Eliot Stokes knocks at Baranbas' door.

"You need me." He says "Before Julia opens the door."

Barnabas wonders how the man seems to know everything.

"Thank Miss Winter, Miss Evans, and Miss Stoddard. They put it together."

Stokes puts Julia under and makes her resume her dream.. She sees Woodard again, but this time Eliot steps in.

"You are not using your real name. Your are not using your real face. I command you to show who you really are."

Woodard's figure dissolves and Angelique stands there.

"So, you seek to escape, and to do so, you capture the psychic energy that people release when they fight off their fears. Yes. I can see that. What have you done to deserve prison?"

"It is all Barnabas' fault. He lied to me. He did not love me."

"So you are the woman who set Olajuwon on him, who destroyed his family?"

"I am now enslaved to a sorcerer because I lost his love. He has to pay for it."

Stokes gets her to tell her side of the story. Then he notices the flaw.

"Did you use a love spell on Barnabas?"

"Yes."

"Then he never loved you. It was a lie. He did not love you of his own free will. So he could not betray it."

"But..."

"And whoever gave you the love spell played a trick on you. He knew that the spell would be broken, and that his love would go elsewhere. And you would be left a slave."

"He... he tricked me."

"Yes. And because of that you are not truly beholden to him. You may claim your freedom again."

Julia wakes up, calmer, and Stokes tells her and Barnabas what happened.

"Angelique is fae, and like all fae, does not have a good grasp of good and evil in human terms. She is basically amoral. And it was your bad luck that she got infatuated with you."

He tells Barnabas not to release her until he can make terms for it.


	63. Note on 1968

The entire 1968 storyline is sorely in need of a reboot. There are just too many things wrong with it. Interesting storylines and characters that went nowhere. A meandering narrative. A suddenly passive Barnabas. A stumbling along for a narrative that worked. And an intriguing plot ruined by its execution (the Dream Curse)

Here are my complaints:

Why allow a wonderful character like Tony Peterson to fade away? Why get a very wicked woman, Danielle Roget, to come back to life, and then not have her don any wickedness worth noticing? Why have Nicholas Blair allude to the plot that brought him to Collinsport, and then drop it without notice?

And Barnabas in the original loses more than his fangs when Eric Lang gets hold of him. He loses agency. He will no longer initiate action, but react to it. Adam drives the action, Cassandra/ Angelique drives the action, Julia drives the action, Nicholas drives the action. Barnabas reacts. Every now and then he will make a decision, but it will be in the context of what someone else initiates. You cannot have that.

And why Adam? I know, it is a Frankenstein monster, and thus a staple of the horror genre. BUT, why is he horrible? The reason for horror is theological, he is created by Man, not by God, and thus his existence is an abomination. If you are not going to do Theology (and TV writers shouldn't, really. They are worse at it that they are at History), then the only horror element is that he is physically powerful but his intellectual and emotional development is at its beginning stages. The truly frightening about Adam is that he is a newborn baby. Like all babies, he is needy and extremely selfish. But unlike babies, he is powerful enough to grab what he wants. In those terms, Adam could work.

Cassandra... For God's sake, let's get rid of that black wig, the green horror of a dress, and go straight to the vampire in the long flowing robe. Angelique as a vampire is a powerful image. Cassandra is at best a sitcom refugee.

I like the idea of Vicky's trip to the past, and Barnabas going back to save her. But I do not want a romance with Jeff Clark. She and Burke belong together.

The Dream Curse? Wonderful idea, ruined by buckets of dry ice, and images that were not scary at all. We had to be told that they were scary, because that's what the characters said. In contrast, you remember the Grayson Solo, when Julia is being tormented by Woodard's ghost? That was truly grabbing. Now, let's make the Dream Curse offer the equivalent of Grayson Solos for each character. Make us see what they truly fear, what they want to escape. Then you will not need the dry ice anymore.

By the way, about the Jennings brothers, how come if Chris was a werewolf, Tom was not? They were both descended from Quentin, they both shared the curse - they were identical twins, for God's sake. You HAVE to explain that...


	64. Nicholas Blair I

Stokes checks on Adam who is agitated and wants to go out.

"Not now Adam, be patient"

"Now! I want to go out now!"

Stokes\t shakes his head and hopes for the best. Julia accuses him of keeping Adam with them because he does not want to share his studies with anyone else, and Stokes does not deny it.

"But I will move him out soon."

Elizabeth comes back and throws a tantrum when she finds out all that has happened since she went away.

"You got no reason to complain" Roger says "You abandoned your respo

nsibilities. Did you expect us to hold on to your idea of what our responsibilities are?"

Elizabeth is bitter with Vicky for taking over the running of the cannery.

"Would you have preferred it went bankrupt? I made sure that it went on, even if you were not there to supervise it."

Elizabeth makes snide comments about Vicky being "just like her mother." arousing Vicky's curiosity

Nicholas Blair arrives with Tom Jennings in tow. Tom assures him that this is where Angelique brought him.

"Then she got in a struggle with Barnabas Collins and it did not go well for her."

"Well, I will get her back. She is a most useful helper when she is not being rebellious."

He warns Tom Jennings about his trying to escape again.

"I own you, Tom Jennings, and I will not tolerate disobedience."

He rents a cottage which has a nice basement "where I can put Angelique once I get her back."

Elizabeth meets Chris Jennings, who has been warned by Vicky - who also reassures him that Liz cannot fire him, only Vicky can -

Chris does his best to charm Elizabeth, and succeeds. Elizabeth invites him for tea, and to meet Carolyn

"She needs a nice young man like you, not that seedy lawyer."

Tony Peterson enlists the help of Barnabas. He wants to take a deposition, but thinks that his witness is lying, and wants to get to the bottom of it.

Barnabas takes command of the witness, and orders him to tell the truth, all of it.

He does, and Peterson gives a sight of relief.

"I would not have wanted to go into court with what he originally gave me."

Barnabas comments how Peterson reminds him of someone he knew long ago. A clergyman.

"There are clergymen in my grandmother's side of the family."

"Was their last name Trask?"

"Indeed it was. Sanctimonious prigs, as I understand it. I hope I take after my grandfather's side."

Barnabas decides it is wise no to mention the fate of the Trask he knew.

Julia is guiding Adam out for a walk, so that Willie can give his cell a good scrub. She uses the words of control that Stokes taught her, but does not concentrate at her task, as she is mulling over the dream and what it meant, and also irritated that Stokes has not taken Adam away yet.

Adam notices that the leash that holds him is slack, and that Julia is not watching. He grabs the leash with both hands and gives it a strong tug that makes Julia fall. He then runs away.


	65. Nicholas Blair II

Stokes is upset to hear that Adam is missing. He blames Julia for letting him escape, and Julia blames him for not taking him away sooner.

He calls Burke Devlin to help him track the fugitive.

Elizabeth talks to Carolyn telling her what a nice young man Chris Jennings is, and that Carolyn should know him better.

Carolyn is irritated at her mother's attempt at matchmaking and reminds her of her own bad taste in men.

"You could not see through Jason McGuire, could you?"

Elizabeth says that Peterson will never amount to anything, and that Carolyn could do much better.

The sheriff comes to talk

to Julia, because, he says, he thinks that Barnabas has something to do with the roaming man who did so much damage, disappeared, and now is been seen again. "And why would you think that?"

"Call it a hunch. I am going with my gut."

"Well, that is not a very scientific way of doing it."

"I do not need your science to catch wrongdoers."

Nicholas manages to see the box where Barnabas trapped Angelique. He smiles. It can easily be opened. It will take a couple of hours, but he will reclaim his escaped slave.

"You are too useful to me to let you go." he says.

Elizabeth talks to David, and tries to get him to say that he wants Vicky gone. David refuses and gets irritated. As Elizabeth prods him, a log in the fireplace cracks open and shoots sparks that make Elizabeth's gown catch fire.


	66. Nicholas Blair III

Burke gets to Collinsport and confers with Stokes.

He agrees with Julia that Stokes should have moved Adam long ago. "This was never meant to be a permanent arrangement, and the longer it lasted, the greater the chance of it going wrong."

He gets to meet Barnabas and is wary of him.

"What is your relationship with Vicky?" he asks.

"One of mutual benefit. I got sustenance, and she got historical information. There was never anything else between us."

"And yet, I understand that a vampire bite has erotic content."

"Well, I imagine that if it is pleasant for them, they won't struggle. I do not think that there is anything else, unless I would want it to be."

"And you do not want?"

"No, not with her."

"Not your type?"

"I am still mournig my lost love."

Burke is not convinced, but lets it go. He's got Adam to hunt, and that takes priority.

o

Nicholas manages to summon Angelique, breaking her free of her prison.

"Well, my dear, it seems that you do not get rid of me that easily."

Angelique says that he tricked her. That she never had Barnabas' love, and thus could not lose it.

"It does not matter. You agreed with the terms I gave you, and you must abide by them.

" "You have no right over me!"

"You are my slave. Obey."

He shows her the coffin where she must rest during the day.

"Disobey me, and I will lock you into it for days." He says.

o

Chris talk to Vicky about Elizabeth.

"She is matchmaking me with her daughter. I do not know what to do. She might make a stink, and manage to get me fired."

"I hired you, not she."

"But it is her business. I would hate to leave this town. It is so appropriate for what I... want."

0

Nicholas is having a coffee at the diner when there is a conmotion. Adam haa been sighted and they are chasing him. He notest the reaction of Maggie.

Maggie knows more about this creature that she lets it known. Interesting..

o

Carolyn and Tony are discussing the problem that Elizabeth poses when Adam lunges at Carolyn, trying to grab her. Tony fights him and they grapple. Carolyn takes out her gun, and trying not to shoot Tony, manages to graze Adam on the shoulder. Adam screams in pain, and runs away.


	67. Nicholas Blair IV

Adam staggers away, leaving a trail of blood.

Burke goes in search of him, hoping to find him before the sheriff does. Stokes has given him a way to track his psychic signature, and he hopes that it will be enough.

Tom Jennings catches a glimpse of his brother, Christopher, and decides to appeal to him for help in escaping Nicholas.

Nicholas also looks for Adam, curious as to why it feels so... different from other people. He does see him crouching under bushes, and approaches him, hoping to put him in his power. He does feel strange indeed.

Burke then moves in, followed by Willie and Stokes. He shoots Adam with a tranquilizer dart, and between him and the others he moves it away to the car he drove to that point. Nicholas senses the power that Stokes has - and Burke - and decides not to fight them for possession of the strange creature.

But there is someone else who knows...

Stokes takes Adam away, and leaves Burke behind.

"You should stay here and cooperate with Barnabas in what he needs."

"But..."

"I know you have issues with the fact that he has fed on Vicky in the past and will continue to do so. Well, this will be your test of character, to see if you can overcome your feelings and do what needs to be done." he sighs. "If you screw up, he will not be as easy to kill as poor Peter.."

At night, Nicholas calls on Angelique. He orders her to attack Maggie and put her under her power, then bring her to him so he can interrogate her. He gives Angelique a charm to put around Maggie's neck.

"With his on, Barnabas will not sense what you have done, and will not interfere... These vampires who appoint themselves protectors of their place can be a nuisance sometimes."


	68. Nicholas Blair V

Barnabas watches as Stokes gets Adam into the car to drive him away.

He regrets that he could not make headway with Adam, but Stokes reassures him "you did your best for him."

Julia and Willie are relieved to see him go.

The Sheriff talks to Burke, with Burke apologizing for missing the truth about Laura.

The Sheriff asks him about Barnabas Collins.

Burke is curious as to why the Sheriff is curious about him. He is tempted to let the truth come out, but remembers Stokes' warning. He is supposed to cooperate with Barnabas and help him

. He manages to get an admission from the Sheriff that he feels guilty when he did not pay attention when Woodard tried to warn him about something going on

"So Dave had to go and get help from someone else. But why him?"

Burke says that there is probably not much of trail on Barnabas. "I could ask him, but if he told me, he would have to shoot me." he says.

"What do you mean?"

"I have run across his type before. To find out more about him would violate the Official Secrets Act, I think."

"You mean that he is a British spy?"

"He is retired, back to his old family home..Wanted the quiet life for change. And when Woodard told him of his suspicions, he got a hankering to do one more job." "

And got Dave killed."

"He forgot that amateurs can be a bloody nuisance. Woodard was an amateur, and so he got himself killed..."

He hopes that Patterson is happy with this scenario.

Angelique puts Maggie in her power and brings her to Nicholas.

There, Nicholas interrogates her about Adam, and she recites what she knows.

Nicholas is intrigued by her description, and he uses Angelique's power over her to awaken a photographic memory of what she read on the disk and to have her recite it. Having finished, Maggie collapses.

"Put her in the other bedroom" he says. "I want to know more about her abilities with those... computers."

"Can I feed from her again?"

"Not yet. We may have to release her so that Barnabas does not start looking for her. But in a couple of days, you can feed again


	69. Nicholas Blair VI

Nicholas is fascinated by the knowledge that Maggie has of computers.

"So much power at one's fingertips."

It is a different power than the one he has, and he wants to get hold of it. For the time being, he has Angelique retunr her to her home, with no memory of her experience, but plans to recall her later on.

Now he has to ruminate what he learned of Lang's notes. Not sewing parts together (any surgeon can do that), but the technique of reanimating dead flesh. If he could offer a host body to a bodyless spirit... like a will-of-the wisp...

David is studying his lesson, irritated because he does want to go out. He grumbles that Vicky gives him too much work to keep him occupied so that she can go meet with Burke.

Elizabeth agrees, and says that she can prevail over Roger and Carolyn to have Vicky fired

. As she says the word "fired" a log crackles in the fire and a flame shoots up.

Tom Jennings calls on Chris, telling him that he is in trouble, and that he needs help in getting out of town.

Chris is irritated, because Tom is always in trouble.

"Running away from the police again?"

"No, it is much worse."

"Maybe you should go to the cops. Offer testimony against the one you are running from. Get into witness protection."

"It will do no good with what I am dealing with. And I have no control over the wolf again"

Against his better judgement, Chris promises to help. He will get the money that Tom needs, and give it to him in a day or two.

Nicholas orders Angelique to kill a young woman and bring her body to him. Angelieque does so, and brings him the body, which Nicholas takes to his basement, where he will replicate Lang's experiment.


	70. Nicholas Blair VII

Nicholas begins to animate the body, and summons a will-of-the wisp. The wisp flutters about trying to evade Nicholas, but Nicholas, using Angelique's help, forces it into the body.

"You are trapped now and in my power." Nicholas says "You are my slave now." He leaves Angelique watching over the body.s.

Vicky and Burke have a long conversation, with Burke explaining what his relationship with Stokes is, and Vicky explaining that she has no interest in Barnabas, except as an historical source. Burke hopes that Stokes will allow him to remain in Collinsport.

Nicholas looks for Tom Jennings, as he moves across Collinwood, he sees sparks coming out of the window.

"A wild talent" he says. "Of course, the phoenix child."

At dusk, Tom meets with Chris, who gives him the money. He says that he is done with the life he's lived, and that he is going to make a new start

"I have heard this song and dance before" Chris grumbles, but hopes that this time it will work.

As Tom leaves, Nicholas comes in.

"I warned you what the price would be." he says.

He gestures, and Tom falls down, choking. "You will die, as I promised."

Chris beats on him, trying to get to release Tom.

"Ah, werewolf. You think it is safe to go out now because it is not yet the full moon? Well, you are wrong." He makes a couple of passes and Chris falls down, as the transformation into wolf takes place.


	71. Nicholas Blair VIII

Chris Jennings races through the woods, tearing everything in its path.

He senses prey and stalks it.

He catches a rabbit and tears it, devouring it with great gulps. The he senses bigger prey.

He finds a girl who is cutting through the woods and chases after her. The girls screams and runs, but Chris if faster.

Attracted by the screams, Barnabas swoops in just as Chris has bitten the girl.

Barnabas and Chris grapple and Barnabas manages to chase Chris away. He then attends to the victim, but as she is bleeding, and he has been wounded, he begins to feed.

He is then hit by a rubber ball and hears the song "London Bridge".

He is aware that he may be taking too much, so he picks the girl up and takes her to the hospital. He gives a description of the creature, which the girl corroborates.

He is relieved that it is not Adam - who is away - so it cannot be tied to him. He wonders if this is another of Lang's experiments...

Chris staggers back to where the body of Tom Jennings lies. Wounded, he begins devouring the body of his brother to heal himself.


	72. Nicholas Blair IX

Barnabas talks to Julia and Burke about the "beast" he met, and they wonder if he might be anohter of Lang's experiments. When Barnabas describes the creature, and notes that there was something that reminded him of a wolf, Julia remembers Tom Jennings telling her he had been a werewolf.

"And now there is this new manager called Chris Jennings, who looks a lot like him." she says.

They decide to investigate Chris Jennings. Burke will meet him the next day at his place of work.

The next day Chris Jennings calls in sick, and then drives away out of town.

In the meantime Nicholas tries to get Eve , the will-of-the wisp he embodied, to obey him. She is most reluctant, and, Nicholas finds out too much of a wild talent. He gives up for the day, and locks her up, while he goes to Collinwood and tries to attract David to himself.

When Angelique wakes up she finds Eve beating on the walls, angry with being locked up, first in dead flesh, and then inside the house. Angelique shows her then electric outlets, and tells her that her power can travel through electric lines. Eve gives it a try, and makes several streetlighs break.

"I can do this!"

"Yes. But now try to appear contrite and docile. He has to let you go, because the body you are wearng is supposed to have a job. Use that job to make a lot of mischief. With enough mischief, people will start hunting Nicholas, and we can use that to be free."

David meets with Nicholas, who tries to awaken his phoenix talent. "Now you can only make sparks and some flames shoot out of the fireplace. But you could do much more. And I can teach you how." David asks him what can he do, and Nicholas promises to teach him if David accepts him as a teacher. David is a bit wary, but says taht he will meet Nicholas again


	73. Nicholas Blair X

Eve sits at a console at her job (the one that her host body held), and sends her power over the lines. Electric lighst pop up and burst, causing a major blackout. She laughs... "pretty" she says.

She sends a power surge to the factory, causing a short circuit, and starting a fire. "pretty... pretty...pretty"

Willie talks to Maggie, much relieved that Adam is gone for good.

"Now we can concentrate in renovating the Old House and making it a proper inn. Maybe we can get Barnabas to join the guests in period costume, and talk to them about life in those early times"

Maggie is distratcted, and unable to concentrate, but Willie is so enthusiastic that he does not see it, nor the way she rubs her throat.

Nicholas gives David a medallion. "Use it to concentrate. You have powers, kid, but they are unfocused. You have a great destiny ahead. They do not understand you. You are special, and they want to make you ordinary like them."

Back home, Maggie puts the disks from Lang in her computer and reads them, memorizing them, as Angelique has instructed her.

Chris Jennings comes back to Collinsport, with heavy chains. He reaches his home, and is stopped there by Burke Devlin. "You are the werewolf" Burke says pointing a gun a him. "Give me a reason why I should not shoot you."


	74. Nicholas Blair XI

Chris tells his tale to Julia and Barnabas, insisting that he always keeps himself under control, locked up in nights of the full moon, but that the wizard that enslaved his brother Tom made him go wolf out of schedule.

Burke is impatient because Chris does not know the name of the wizard, nor can provide a description. Barnabas thinks that by putting Chris in an hypnotic trance he might remember more details.

Maggie keeps reading the Lang files non-stop. Angelique, after visiting her and reinforcing her power over her, notices that her health seems to be failing.

She tells Nicholas who shrugs. "She is not likely to survive after I get the information out of her, anyway. I will know everything she knows when I am done, and will no longer need her."

He then goes to Eve and punishes her for using her powers without his knowledge. He tells Ange

lique to watch over Eve, and to make it easier for her, he makes her able to withstand the sunlight until he comes back. "But I need to rest."

"Be careful that I do not punish you too." He then goes to meet David, and give him more lessons about controlling the fire.

Angelique goes to Eve and tells her to use her powers again.

"And he will punish me."

"If you do this right, you and I will go free."

Nicholas, in his way to meet David, comes across Vicky who wants to know who he is, and why is he around Collinwood. She tries to call, but Nicholas gestures, and she falls down, in what looks like a stroke.

Eve starts her fireworks display with the electric wires, making the hospital go dark (until the geneators kick in) as well as most of the houses. Then she starts fires on the fishing boats.

Angelique, taking advantage that he can now stand sunlight, flies to where Barnabas is and meets Julia.

"I want you to do for me what you did for Tom Jennings" she says.

Julia begins to protest by Angelique stops her.

"I can tell you who it is that made Chris lose control. And why all the lights are going of, and how to save Maggie Evans' life."


	75. Nicholas Blair XII

Burke sets out a plan of action. He will need Julia's cooperation in distilling certain chemicals that he will use to banish Nicholas.

"He cannot be killed, but he can be banished".

Barnabas will provide the muscle, as Nicholas will have Eve and her powers defending them, as well as Angelique - who will not try very hard.

Willie will bring extra firepower. Julia promises Angelique that she will cure her once Nicholas is banished.

In Collinwood Elizabeth is sitting by the fireplace, fuming at Vicky and her "usurpation" A voice comes from the flames.

"If you help me, I will get rid of her."

"Who are you?"

"David has the power. Ask him."

Nicholas has Angelique summon Maggie, so that he can empty her mind, and store her knowledge away. He has her lie down and starts making passes over her, when a shot, fired by Willie interrupts him.

He sees Willie, Barnabas, and Burke. He commands Angelique and Eve to attack them.

Angelique bites Willie, while Barnabas grapples with Eve

"You will have to kill me" Eve says, knowing that this is how she will be free again. Still, she sends her power, causing fires close by.

Burke faces with Nicholas and throws the formula that Julia has agiven him. As Nicholas is slowed, Burke recites the formula of banishment.

Nicholas disappears in a cloud of smoke, while Barnabas tears up Eve, and as he does, he feels the joy of the will-of-the-wisp who is free again.

Angelique gets up, licking her lips while Willie staggers up. "Well, he is gone." she says.

Barnabas looks at Eve's body. "I had to kill her...I was supposed to protect her, because she fed me."

"She was already dead. Nicholas needed a dead body to reanimate."

"And how did she originally die?"

"Nicholas had me kill her. Anyone. It had to be female and young, and freshly killed."

"And you didn't care."

"I did what I had to do."

Barnabas is disgusted with her, and Angelique is hurt by his rejection. Still, Julia promised her a cure, and she will take it.

Willie helps Maggie who seems comatose, and they get her back in the car.


	76. Chris Jennings I

After they take Maggie to the hospital, they come back to the Old House and find that it is on fire - a result of Eve's onslaught.

Between the four of them they manage to put out the fire, but there is considerable damage.

"It will take a while to get it back to normal" Willie says. "but it can be done."

Barnabas retires to his coffin, and Julia gives Angelique her first injection. She seems puzzled as to the looks of horror in the other's faces.

"Why do you look at me as if I was a monster?" she asks.

Elizabeth talks to David.

"I am your only friend here." she says. "They all want to lock you away. Roger, Carolyn, even Vicky. She wants to get a better job and you are in the way. But we can beat them. You have the power."

Chris talks to Burke and Julia, explains that he has an hereditary curse, from an unknown ancestor..

"They said that it was an important man, who did not want inconveninet children. Still, we were told, he was cursed, and so all his male descendant. Tom and I were the last of the line."

He shows them a pewter medal, who he says, is all his family has from that unkown ancestor.. Burke notes the marks at the back of the medal, the maker's mark, and notes that it is unusual. He takes it to have Vicky trace it.


	77. Chris Jennings II

As Willie begins the task of fixing the Old House, Burke determines that until they are certain that Nicholas's spell over Chris is gone, he is to be guarded EVERY night, not just the night of the full moon.

Julia begins distilling tranquilizer and sleeping potions in the basement - she regrets that both Lang and Woodard are dead and cannot write prescriptions, so she is left with buying a lot of poppy seeds to distill opiates.

Barnabas offers the locked room in the cemetery where his coffin was locked, and says that he will check on Chris, and release him if he does not transform.

Vicky has looked into the medal, and is one of a series made by local jeweler, Braithwaite, back at the end of the nineteenth century. Since the design is not the standard one, it must be a special order.

She checks, and the Braithwaite jewelry store is still in business. Now it is a question of looking into their files.

She says that since it was a local jeweler, the ancestor that brought the curse to Chris might have been a local. She is going to check on her oral history informants to see if there are reports of furry beatsts that haunted the woods, and even attacked people on occasion.

It is night, and when Barnabas checks on Chris, he is still human.

Barnabas decides to release him, as tonight is not the night. As the move throught he woods, Baranbas notices that Chris has lagged behind. When he turns towards the other man, he sees that Chris is in the throes of a transformation.

Chris lounges at him, but Barnabas is armed with tranquilizer darts, and sedates Chris, after which he drags him away to the secret room again.

Elizabeth eggs David on. "They want to take you away. They want to lock you in a military school. Or worse. I am your only friend. We need to fight them. And you have the power."

David concetrates in front of the fire, and then a small fire burst in Roger's room.


	78. Chris Jennings III

The furniture in Roger's room begins to rattle, and a book falls on him. He wakes up and sees the shaking furniture and the fire, and races for the extinguisher.

As he puts out the fire he sees a man's face hovering over the room.

Angelique has been cured, and she leaves Collinsport. "I hope that one day I can make him change his mind. But I cannot bear to look at him they way he thinks of me."

Burke contacts the Braithwaite firm, which confirms that it the medal was made by them, but refuse to let him see the records.

"We pride ourselves in the confidentiality of our clients" the owner, Ezra Braizhwaite tells him.

Willie comes back from the hospital, saying that Maggie seems unresponsive. He is afraid that Nicholas might have damaged her irreparably. He talks to Barnabas about it, who says that he might be able to coax Maggie back into herself, using the link he has with her.

Julia prepares more tranquilizer for Chris, and asks him to keep an hour-by-hour journal to have a way to predict when he might transform. He is reluncant to go to work, and asks to have the paperwork for the cannery delivered to him.

Barnabas appears in Maggie's hospital room, after hypnotizing the nurse. He links with her, after biting her again, and commands her to remember. Maggie opens her eyes, and focus on him.

"Mr. Barnabas. , you are back. You had vanished." she says.

Barnabas realizes that she is now reverted to Phyllis Wick.


	79. Chris Jennings IV

Vicky talks to Tony Peterson if there is a legal way to force Braithwaite to give up the files. Peterson explains that a proper court order is needed if that information is to be used legally.

"Because if it illegally obtained it cannot be used as evidence in the court of law"

Of course, they have no intention of using it in a court of law, now or ever. Peterson says that he must advice them that hiring Ninja Carolyn to steal it is highly unethical and he cannot be part of it.

Vicky undestands and talks to Carolyn directly

Burke calls on Stokes to see if anything can be done about Maggie.

"You got rid of Blair but did not seal his doings. Why is that everyone makes the same mistakes?"

Stokes agrees to go to Collinsport, and in the meantime, to punish Burke for his oversight, he orders him away from Collinsport and his budding romance with Vicky.

Sam makes plans to send Vicky to Wyncliffe (which is now under new management) to see if she can be helped there.

David and Elizabeth talk again. Elizabeth reminds David that she is the only one who believes in him, that everyone else is against him. As she speaks we see Laura's face appear on the flames.

As this happens, tehre is a commotion upstairs, with furniture tossed about. They race upstairs and they find, written on the mirror the words "Jamison don't"


	80. Chris Jennings V

Carolyn, in full ninja gear, with Barnabas' help, gets into the Braithwaite records and finds the info on Chris' medal. It was commissioned by Jenny Collins - two, one for a boy and another for a girl. Paid by Judith Collins after Jenny failed to come pick them up.

"So Chris is a Collins" Barnabas says. "Probably his parents angered Olajuwon too."

Roger talks to Professor Stokes about the "poltergeist" that is harassing him and his family.

"And there is fire, too sometimes."

Professor Stokes will call in Madame Findley, a first rate medium, to get to the bottom of it.

Later Stokes talks to Barnabas about Maggie. He knows how to undo the damage that Nicholas inflicted on her. But he needs help. Since she has been taken to Wyncliffe, they have to kidnap her so that Stokes can do her ritual uninterruped.

Barnabas, Willie, and Julia will bring her. Willie will drive the van, Julia will use her knowledge of the place, to find her, and her histrionic hability to distract the staff. Barnabas will summon Maggie, using the link he has with her.

Then get Maggie into the van and take her to Stokes.

Stokes conducts the ritual, and after a while, he is successful. Maggie is herself again.

Maggie is unwilling to go on. It is scarier and more dangerous than what Joe did. She prefers not to have anything else to do with it. Not for a while. She gives stokes the disks from Dr. Lang, and asks Barnabas not to ask her again. Just blood if he wants but no more. She is just going to take care of her father now, and wait for Joe.


	81. Chris Jennings VI

Chris discusses his "going wolf" schedule with Professor Stokes who begins supplying him with tranquilizing drugs, after consulting with Julia.

He notes that there seems to be a pattern. If the pattern holds, Chris might resume a more normal life, when he knows which nights he has to lock himself away.

"Or you might learn to control it" he says. "Turn into wolf, but keep your human mind, so that you will know to stay away from people and go hunt game"

Chris assents to this, but as he is leaving he begins transforming again and goes after Professor Stokes. Stokes is nonplussed and shoots him with tranquilizer darts.

"I guess that the schedule needs more work" he says.

David and Elizabeth stare at the fire, entranced. Vicky finds them that way, and asks them what they are doing.

Elizabeth turns haughtily to her. "You ask too many questions for a servant, Miss Winters"

"I am David's teacher. I want him to know what he is doing"

"What he is doing, he is doing with my complete approval. Now go and do the things you prefer to do, but I warn you, your time here is limited."

As she speaks a book flies across the room and hits her. We see a man's face for a few seconds, then it vanishes.

Tony Peterson tells Barnabas that there seemed to be what looked like werewolf attacks back at the end of the century, during a full moon.

"And none after that". He says that he is willing to do more research if Barnabas helps him again with coaxing a reluctant witness.

"You are not asking him to commit perjury, are you?"

"No. Just want him to tell me what he knows. You should see how many people lie to lawyers, even when it is against their interest."

Mrs. Janet Findley comes to Collinsport to investigate the haunting there.


	82. Chris Jennings VII

Peterson tells Barnabas that he found the death certificate of Jenny Collins - wife of Quentin Collins. And that Quentin Collins disappeared from Collinsport and was declared dead, with his share of the inheritance being given to his siblings.

"Nothing for his children?"

"No mention of children." "And he just disappeared."

"Yes."

"At a time when there were werewolf atttacks.

" "The beast that ravaged a couple of villagers was no identified as a werewolf. But the families of those killed were given a considerable sum of money by Edward and Judith Collins."

So, if Chris Jennings is a descendant of Quentin Collins, Quentin's children were kept hidden by the rest of the family. Because of greed? Or because they were considered shameful in any way.

In Collinwood, Mrs. Janet Findley has arrived. She senses a presence and tries to follow it.

"Who are you, what do you wish?"

She hears the words "Save Nora... Must save Nora..."

She goes down the stairs as David watches. He pulls down a string across the steps and makes her fall.

As the rest of the family rushes to her, she manages to say "Quentin... save Nora..." before she dies.


	83. Chris Jennings VIII

Chris says that he has the "lady in grey" that shows to his family at this time of the year, weeping and trying to talk to them, but without making a sound. Stokes notes this, as well as Vicky's comment on David staring at the fire with Elizabeth "It reminded me of Laura" she says.

Stokes wonders how all this ties together. He talks Barnabas into providing his "special power" to be able to visualize what went on. He, Barnabas, Vicky, and Julia will hold a seance to be able to "see" what happened.

At the first attempt, Peter Guthrie appears to them, telling them to beware of Laura who can reach across time.

"For she was not properly sealed when she was stopped".

Then a scene begins to form before them.

It is the "lady in grey" talking to a woman who is caring for two children

"Their mother wanted them to have this." she says, giving her two medals. "It is all they will have of her. It is unfair that the family does not want to acknowledge them, but we must obey them."

"They will be loved." the woman says.

We learn that the "lady in grey"'s name is Beth Chavez.

There is another scene, with Beth Chavez writing, very disturbed. We see her going to see the children and giving the caretaker the note.

"They must always be on guard. The full moon is their enemy now. This is their only share in their father's inheritance"

Another scene. A man is talking to Beth Chavez. He says that they must stop Laura before she kills Nora.

"Are you sure of it?"

"I wish I was not."

His name is Quentin.

"I have done a lot of wrong things, but it seems that I am the one to put things right this time."

As he is about to leave, he bends over in pain.

"Quentin, what is it?" She rushes to him.

"It feels like... like the curse."

" "But it is not the full moon."

Beth kneels by his side, trying to steady him. "Do I call a doctor?"

"No... no.."

Then he rises, hair sprouting all over him. Beth screams and tries to run, but the werewolf catches her and kills her.

Then a man appears and shoots Quentin, who falls dead. We see Laura come behind him.

"Well done, Dirk. Now, go tell Edward that his brother was the werewolf that terrorized the town, and that he has killed Beth Chavez."


	84. Chris Jennings IX

Stokes tells Barnabas, Julia, and Vicky what he has deduced. Quentin Collins is the ancestor of Chris Jennings, and the werewolf curse comes from him. He might have been cursed in Europe, and has just returned, or has been cursed soon after he returned.

In any case, he returned and found Laura who was about to sacrifice Nora to seal the power in Jamison. Quentin knew of it and was about to stop it, with the help of Beth Chavez, who was the only contact the family allowed Quentin's children (why were they unacknowleged?), but Laura forced the wolf change in Quentin out of the lunar cycle - and that's why as the anniversary of Nora's sacrifice comes near and Laura is reaching againt to David, that Chris Jenning's cycle has become unpredictable = and had him killed by one of her minions.

The family hid the fact that Quentin was the werewolf that had attacked the village, paid off anyone who knew, and Quentin just disappeared from the family history. Laura sacrificed Nora, went herself in flames,, to reappear years later and marry her grandson, Roger.

As they talk, the main house goes up in flames and the family runs away, to take refuge in the Old House, where they see with horror that David rushes back into the burning house.

Stokes tells Barnabas that he has to go into the past, to stop Laura from sacrificing Nora, and to SEAL HER PROPERLY this time. Barnabas reminds him that he was chained in the coffin at that time. Stokes says that he will send someone back to unlock the coffin.

He says that he senses that Julia had a previous incarnation - Magda Rakosi, so that she will go back, unlock the coffin, and write the proper spell for sealing Laura after she has been defeated, and put it in Barnabas' coffin so he can find it.

"We need to time this well" Stokes says. "We better send you a few months before, so that you can establish yourself, and become acquainted with Quentin, so that you can assist him. And maybe find out how he acquired the curse, and find a way to counteract it."

Julia stares as the I Ching bands and goes back in time. Barnabas waits until she has come back before plunging in.

They see as Magda stops, stares in the distance, shivers uncontrollably, and then see her expression change. She sits down and writes the formula that Stokes made her memorize. She goes out and meets Sandor who tells her that Edith is calling her.

"I will be there. As soon as I gather my things." she tells her. He insists on having her come right now, and pulls her. Julia trips him, and as he falls down, he hits his head. Julia checks that he is breathing, and then races to the mausoleum. She gets in, opens the coffin, and drops the formula inside. Then she races back towards Sandor. She then shivers again, loses focus, and she is Magda again.

Julia is back "It is done" she says.

Now is Barnabas' turn and he stares at the I Ching wands.


	85. Quentin's curse I

Barnabas stares at the I Ching cards, seeking the door that will allow him go to back to his previous body.

In the meantime, Collinwood burns, and we see Elizabeth run towards it. Laura, in her ghostly form calls her and says that her sacrifice will seal the power of the phoenix in David. "For I am more powerful than you imagine."

Vicky comes to where Julia, Stokes, and Barnabas are, sitting by the I Ching, telling them that Elizabeth is running towards the burning house. Stokes sighs. "It is all up to Barnabas now"

And then the action freezes.

And we see Barnabas' astral body moving through the I Ching door.


	86. Note on the end of 1968

I had to change a bit the story of Nicholas and Eve. In the original, they promised much, and delivered little. Eve was supposed to be this wicked woman who spread destruction around her, but ended up in a romantic triangle (or quadrangle, or whatever) and the only thing that she does is reject Adam.. quite a comedown for the wickedest woman in the world. And Nicholas who has this plan (diabolical) when he comes in, gets derouted, and ends up courting Maggie and matchmaking and couples counseling for Adam. Eve may just be a will-of-the-wisp trapped in a human body, but she can do a lot of damage through the electric wires. And Nicholas has the same motivation. Recapture escaped slaves, get new slaves, get new knowledge, get more power. He becomes more and more dangerous as there are more things for him to try to get hold of.

And the storyline of Chris must also be tweaked. He is not a dummy who forgets when the next full moon is, and fails to take precautions. He has it under control. That is, until his being in Collinsport makes the metamorphosis get out of schedule, and will need more help to keep it controlled. (His interest in Colllinsport is the abundant game - his plan is to go deep into the woods when the full moon is coming, metamorphose, and hunt wild game, so that he does not need to chain himself up those nights). Also the original Quentin ghost story had two problems. One, that is was based on a Henry James story which might be heavy on atmosphere and psychological insight, but has practically no action. Strong atmospherics do not a compelling show make. And as the story develops, we see that the writers have no idea who Quentin is and what is is story.. and when we to got he past, the Quentin we meet does not have the same personality as the specter that haunts the place. Also, in the original trip to 1895 we meet Laura, who is supposed to come claim her children. Barnabas stops her, but in the original 1895, when Barnabas had not gone back, who stopped Laura? Somebody must or there would be no Jamison. That is why I say that in the original Nora was the one sacrificed to seal the power in Jamison. Quentin figured it out, and tried to stop it - because thouh he was a rake and a rotter, he loved his nephews. But he had already been cursed and all that Laura had to do was to make the metamorphosis come earlier. And as the anniversary of the sacrifice came closer, Chris, Quentin's descendant, has his own schedule thrown out of whack.

And now on to 1895...


	87. Quentin's curse II

Barnabas rises from his coffin at dusk, and goes out to scout out the situation. He is hungry and attacks Roxanne Drew - the Collins' family governess. He is not aware of how hungry he is, and takes more than he should. He manages to control himself and pulls out of her throat in time, but he is aware that this will start talk about "animal attacks" and might start pulling out old records from 1785.

He needs to be able to law low and let things lie down until he can introduce himself. He goes to the Old House, where he finds Sandor and Magda. He puts them in his power, and feeds off Sandor. He has them tell him what is going on. Seems that the old matriarch is dying, and that the grandchildren, Edward, Judith, and Carl, are attending her, and trying to sway her into changing her will in their favor.

"And Quentin?' he asks.

"Gone, with Edward's wife. If he knows what is good for him he will not come back."

A family fighting for inheritance is not likely to welcome a long lost relative who might want to muscle in. He realizes that this a situation such as Burke Devlin described, of being caught in the shrapnel of another people's gunfight. If he wants to introduce himself, he needs to come up with a cover story that reassures them that he wants to put no claims to the inheritance.

He will want to look at his old papers, in the hope that the family kept them - in the hope that he might come back, or from unwillingness to let them go, or whatever.

He finds the cache of jewesl, and takes a couple only from the bottom, so that the bulk of it will be there when Willie gets him out.

Then, with Sandor, they go over old papers, and to Barnabas' relief, he finds the documents about his partnership with Nathan Forbes to produce maple sugar. "Yes, that will be a nice cover story. I find out that I might have a stake in a commercial enterrpise, and have come to look at the property. If they ask me about the inheriticane, I will tell them that my great-grandfther, the first Barnabas, was disinherited by Jamison Collins, and the likelihood of THAT being overturned is too small to worry about."

But in the meantime, he needs to law low for a while, and feed unobtrusively. Let what happened to Miss Drew be an isolated incident, that will be later chalked out to the werewolf, he THAT appears.


	88. Quentin's curse III

At the main house, Edward is talking to Carl, who keeps making jokes, to Edward's irritation.

"Try to pay attention, Carl. It is our future that is being decided."

"Grandmama said that I would be looked after, no matter what, that I did not need to worry."

Edward grumbles. "Still I need your help. Remind grandmama that the only heirs to us four will be my children. Without no Jamison and Nora, no one will inherit. Judith is single, you are unlikely to be married, so that's me."

"You do not count Quentin."

"Do you think that Grandmama will make him the heir?"

"Quentin has children."

"Forget the half-breeds. We have been more than generous to them".

Reverend Gregory Trask comes in, and is welcomed by Judith, while Edward grumbles. He is come to pay his respects to Edith Collins

"And see if he can sway her to give him a legacy" Edward grumbles.

At the Old House, Barnabas confers with Sandor and Magda. Sandor cannot find any Forbes' descendants, but says that he knows who can look for them. A guy named Roger Peterson, whose specialty is looking over old records.

He also appraises Barnabas of the situation at the Old House.

The four siblings, Judith, Edward, Quentin, and Carl, are constrained by the will of their father, who, disappointed in his children, has made his mother, Edith, the administrator of the fortune, with instructions to designate the "most worthy heir" at her death, and the new administrator if there is a need for one, along with any other conditions.

"Was he disappointed?"

"Very much." Magda sats

"Quentin is a rake who only cares for his pleasure, no matter what scandal it brings, Carl is a fool who lives to play practical jokes. Edward has made bad business decisions and needed to be rescued."

"And Judith?"

"Judith is a woman, and unmarried."

"So the father turned the decisions over to his mother..."

"He was a mama's boy" Magda interjects.

At the big house, Reverend Traks talks with Edith, who seems interested in his words. Downstairs, Edward argues with Judith that he is not sending his children at the Trask school.

"They should remain here, and learn how to be a Collins"

"They should learn how to be proper Christians. And with Miss Drew sick."

"She is getting better. She will be able to resume teaching in a day or two. And these are MY children. I decide their education."

As Reverend Trask leaves, Edith calls a servant and ask her to call on her solicitor to come, And to be witness to the change in her will.


	89. Quentin's curse IV

Peterson tells Barnabas that he tracked Nathan Forbes' heirs. They are direct heirs as Suki had left her son with her sister when she went to track her wayward husband. They did not have much, but they got Nathan's papers which included the deed, plus some money from the Collins family (which, Barnabas mused, might have to do with Joshua buying their silence about Forbes' bigamous marriage to Millicent).

In any case the property exists and even manages to sell some maple syrup locally. Plans to extract sugar went out the window when one partner died and the other one mysteriously disappeared. Barnabas tells Peterson to approach the current owner to appraise him of his claim, and his desire to invest into modernizing the place (figuring that willingness to spend money instead of trying to wrest control will be more welcome).

Roxanne Drew gets up as she hears strange noises from above. She wants to know why is anyone moving furniture at this hour of the night. She is confronted by Judith Collins who tells her to stop being concerned with what is none of her business, and implies that she will soon be gone, and that Jamison and Nora will have a more proper education

"What you mean?"

"You teach them godless ways. Reverend Trask showed me what a bad influence you are."

Roxanne flinches but says "I was hired by Mr. Edward Collins. He can fire me anytime he wishes, not you."

"Well, soon he will not have anything to say in the matter."

Edith Collins lies close to death, wondering if she has made the right choice. She calls in Magda to have her read the cards one more time. Magda set out a spread, but all she gets are messages of death.

"You do not tell me anything I do not know already. But have I made the right choice?"

Magda lies down another spread. "Beware of those who talk of God but whose works are those of the Devil"

Edith smiles at that. "Yes, I made the right choice after all."


	90. Quentin's curse V

Beth Chavez talks to Judith about the medals that were made for "those children"

Judith reminds her that she must never mention them.

"It is hard for me because I hear about them."

"You forget yourself, you are a servant and must obey"

Beth accepts the reproof but insists, meekly. "Still, could it be possible to give them the medals? It has their names, but no last names. And they have a gypsy motif."

"So, what do you say?"

"If they have them, they cannot connect the medals to the family, while if you keep them, someone will ask questions."

Judith looks haughtily at her. "You think too much for a maid."

"It would be the only legacy they will have of their mother."

Edward comes in "I think that Ms. Chavez makes a good point. We want their memory gone, don't we sister dear? With the medals away, then all memories will go with them."

He gives Beth permission to give the medals to the children. Judith gives him a poisonous look.

"You are not yet the master of the house"

"Neither are you, sister dear."

We see Beth giving the medals to the woman who cares for the children, as we saw it in the previous scene. We hear that they are the children of Quentin and Jenny Collins.

"And he is gone away, and she..."

"Poor children, they have no one."

Barnabas has contacted the current owner of the maple syrup concern, and, using some of the jewels, done his investment. He is a bit worried that he is dealing with Joe Haskell's ancestor, and that if he prospers, Haskell's life in the present will be different... but that might not be a bad thing.

He has Peterson under his control, and has him provide him with an address, where he supposedly resides.

He figures out that there have been no blatant attacks that attract attention, and that it has been a while since Roxanne Drew was attacked, so no one might see a coincidence in him showing up.

He is now ready to meet his 1895 relatives.

In the meantime, Quentin Collins arrives to Collinsport. "Well, let's see if Grandmama left me anytthing. Or if I have to live by my wits."


	91. Quentin's curse VI

Quentin gets a cool reception from his family.

"I do not know how you dare show your face here." Edward says

"I came to see Grandmama one last time."

"Hoping that she leaves you something?"

"She is my Grandmama, just as she is yours."

"You cannot stay in the house. Go to the Old House to say with the gypsies"

"No" Judith says. "We must not give scandal. We said that he and his wife left, and that she died abroad. We do not want questions."

"So we welcome him back?"

"He can stay in the East Wing. He can stay in Granduncle Quentin's room. You know that Granpapa Daniel closed it off when he died, same as Morgan. We can use it."

"Your generosity humbles me." Quentin says mockinly

"You stay there. And you do not command the servants. If you want me to convince Grandmama to leave you something, you will do as I say."

"Your generosity still amazes me. All right, take me to Quentin's room.. Yeah, from one Quentin to the other."

As they are getting Quentin packed to the East Wing, Barnabas calls. He says that he is curious to know if they might have been related.

He says that he came to check on a business he inherited, and wondered if the Collins family might be the one that chased his ancestor away "The way they told me, Jeremiah Collins basically had him kidnapped and put on a ship... Jeremiah had a too young new wife, and she liked my ancestor too much..."

The family is suspicious, and wonder if he wants to claim any inheritance.

"Alas, the only will I could contest would be the one of Jeremiah Collins, and it is too late for that."

Quentin asks him why he never heard of a Collins family when he was in England.

"I guess we do not move in the same circles. I do not think that you care for people living in genteel poverty, or working their way up in the world."

The family is hostile to him, and what he represents. Another possible claimant to the inheritance, in spite of their protestations, so he says farewell and leaves. But he has had permission to come in, and that is all he needs. He will be back, but they will not know it.

He comes back to Peterson, who is talking to Reverend Traks

"I warn you, Peterson, keep away from my daughter, or you will regret it."

The arrival of Barnabas interrupts them and Trask leaves, "think of what I said."

Peterson tells Barnabas that he and Charity Trask are in love, but that his father opposes it. Trask has a school, and wants Jamison and Nora to be pupils there

"because he wants influence in the Collins family... Trask follows the money, the mealy mouthed hypocrite."


	92. Quentin's curse VII

Edith calls Magda to her bedside. She tells Magda that she arranged that she and Sandor can remain at the Old House for as long as they live, and that she leaves them a legacy.

She sighs. "I am so sorry about your sister. Maybe she should have stayed with her own people"

"Yeah, she should."

Quentin corrals Beth in the corridor, and reminds her that there was a time when she was not so cold to him.

"Until I learned how big my error was, to trust you."

"But you still have feelings for me."

They are interrupted by Dirk Wilkins who pushes Quentin away.

"You do not command anyone here."

Quentin throws a punch at Wilkins who laughs.

"Yeah, hit me. See how long it takes your Grandma to leave you without a cent if you do."

Roxanne walks out in the garden, seeing how the sun is going to set soon. She feels a chill, which has nothing to do with the breeze and puts her hand on her throat.

Quentin digs into his papers to see if he still has the name that he had written down before he left... and if the man is still there. He races downstairs and leaves the house, saddling his horse. As he gallops away, he sees Barnabas moving closer to the Collinsport grounds. "Well, Cousin Barnabas," he says to himself "taking out the air are you? Or looking for something else?"

Barnabas wants to get some information.. He has already attacked Roxanne once, she has recovered, but the link between the two of them is there. She will give him a few answers.

Quentin reaches the man who now calls himself Evan Hanley, in this century - and who we know as Nicholas Blair

"What brings you in, Mr. Collins?"

"Maybe you can help me get my inheritance."

"I might, if you make it worth my while."

Quentin comes in and explains his situation to Hanley.

"I could make the old lady give you all her money, but with the scandal attached to your name, your brother and sister would say that she was insane, and the judge would agree. What I can do is to make them feel more generous towards you."

"There is a new player, too. Maybe he is what he says. But maybe not. I do not like long lost relatives showing up this close to have a final will written and wintessed."

"Who is this long lost relative?"

"Someone calling himself Barnabas Collins."

In the next room, Angelique hears the name.

"Barnabas!" she says "the one who ruined me, the one who condemned me to this. I will have my revenge on him."


	93. Quentin's curse VIII

Nicholas seeks to learn more about Barnabas, if he might be the same one that was the lover of Angelique. He summons his powers to find him, only to be hit by a blast of fury from Olajuwon.

"He belongs to me!" Olajuwon tells Nicholas. "Do not interfere!:"

Nicholas decides that it is better not to tangle with a vengefult spirit when he does not need to, so he concentrates his power on Edith Collins.

Barnabas is talking with Roxanne, getting her to tell him what she knows and has observed since she came to Collinwood. He is struck by her wit and rebellious spirit, which she has to stifle in her position. She reminds him somehow of Josette, and when he feeds of her, he holds her more affectionately than he intends.

Angelique sees this and fumes. "You forgot me for her! But I will NOT be forgotten!"

Nicholas sees Edith, who is now talking to Edward, who tells her of Quetin's latests escapades.

Edith says "You are right. I have been too indulgent with him. Call the lawyer. I want to change my will. You deserve it better than he does!"

As Edward goes downstairs to go for the lawyer, Nicholas makes Edith's heart fail. The will remains unchanged, and Quentin is not fully disinherited.

He tells that to Quentin.

"But I may not get much."

"You will get somethng."

Barnabas leaves Roxanne and sees Josette gliding on the grass.

"I am sorry, Josette." he says.

Josette comes to him. "it is you... And yet there is something abou you."

"I am out of my time. It is not our time now."

Josette bows her head. "You are right. This is not the time for us... if there is ever going to be a time for us."

In the morning, Angelique goes to the water's edge, where her powers are strongest. She calls on the power of the siren, to call victims to their watery doom.

She calls Roxanne.


	94. Quentin's curse IX

Angelique uses the power of the siren to call Roxanne to the water's edge. Roxanne moves automatically, not aware of what she is doing.

At Collinwood they prepare to listen to the reading of the will when there is a conmotion upstairs, with furniture being thrown around, and screams.

Judith pales and races upstairs, while Quentin laughs

"Not so orderly house, is this"

Edward gives him a cold look. "I hope that Gradnmama disinherited you." he says.

Judith helps Beth subdue a crazed woman that they call "Jenny" and manage to lock her again in the tower room.

"She took me by surprise" Beth says. "Maybe I should have someone with me."

"No, I do not trust anyone else to keep silent about this."

Roxanne moves closer to the edge, and sees Angelique floating over the waves.

"Follow me, Roxanne." Angelique says. "Come, step out from Window's Hill and we will float over the waves"

As Roxanne moves closer Josette appears to Angelique

"If you do this, he will hate you forever. He will never love you, he will dispise you."

Then the scene freezes. And we are back to the present, when Angelique remembers Josette's words. And she remembers Barnabas' face confronting her, the harsh words he used, and the cold hatred in his eyes...

"No. I will go back in time and change it." she says.


	95. Quentin's curse X

Angelique stops her earlier self from luring Roxanne to her death, and releases her. In a daze, Roxanne gets back to Collinwood. Dirk Wilkins make a snide comment when he sees her but no one else seems to notice that she was gone. They are all listening to the will.

Edith has made that Edward's children should inherit all, with a proviso that Jamison is to buy Nora's share of the business in exchange for an annuity – for the property must NOT be divided, as she expects future troubles as shipbuilding shifts to steel instead of wood.

Judith is appointed administrator of the business, and will draw a salary to do so.

Neither of the brothers, Carl, Quentin, or Edward are to be allowed to handle any of it, as they have "fully demonstrated that they cannot be trusted with money"

They will all draw an allowance, which, will revert to Jamison and Nora's share at their deaths.

There is one proviso. Edward will be the one to decide Jamison's education, as Judith has shown a weakness for certain religious types that would give Jamison the wrong training for running a business. Judith can give to the charities of her choice, as well as religious missions out of her salary, but no contributions should be made to them from the family fortune that goes over 5% of the year's profit.

"For while Judith has a steady head on her shoulders, she has a weakness for a certain Reverend that pretends to holiness while fleecing his flock".

Edward says angrily that he will contest the will. The lawyer shrugs and reminds him that his very unwise investments in the past is a strong argument why he should not be allowd to handle money.

"You'd bankrupt the whole family in record time"

"How about us?" Quentin asks

"You will spend it all in two years...and for Carl... well.. no one in his right mind would allow him to administer anything"

Carl pouts, but as he will have a regular allowance, he is content. He can remain at Collinwood and play all the pranks he wants.

Nicholas summons Angelique

"I hope you were not making trouble for Barnabas" he tells her. "I take it that he is the same one you knew."

"Yes. He is now a vampire"...

"And has a protection of sort from Olajuwon who does not want interference when he torments him."

Angelique nods.

"Still, I would like to know what game he plays, and whether or not we are going to clash."

"Do you want me to get the information?"

"You are not to interfere, you understand."

"I will get him to talk, and tell me what he is doing."

"Yes, and what you find out, you will tell me


	96. Quentin's curse XI

When Barnabas arises, Roxanne tells her that she found herself walking towards Widow's Hill and then she woke up. Barnabas is upset at this and wonders if it was is biting that influenced her. He decides that it was time that he spent more time investigating and less talking with Roxanne who has noticed several strange things related to a room in the tower, but cannot tell him more.

The person that he needs is Beth Chavez. He lures her as she is going upstairs, and it is not surprised to see that she is the person they saw on their visions back in the present. He bites her and puts her under his spell, and has her tell him what is going on.

Reluctantly he shows her Jenny, telling him that she is Quentin's wife, a gypsy entertainer that he picked up in one of his trips down South. He quickly tired of her, and pursued other women. Between his abandonment and the scorn in which the family treated her, and some instability in her character, she went mad when Quentin ran away with Laura, Edward's wife.

"The family said that Quentin and Jenny left together, and that Laura went to a sanitarium because she had TB. Much more respectable sounding. And later that Jenny died while abroad. But she is here, and she is mad. She had twins and those were taken from her because she could not care for them. Since they are half-breed, they are not acknowledged by the family, but still, they help out with money and they feel generous doing it."

Barnabas is struck by Jenny'sr resemblance to Magda. "Yes, Magda came looking for her, but she was gone. Magda got in Edith's good graces by pretending to know the future, and thus got to stay. But she is not allowed to wander in the rooms. She stays at the Old House and comes when she is summoned."

So the children that they saw in the vision are Quentin's children and they will inherit Quentin's curse unless he finds a way to stop it.


	97. Quentin's curse XII

Reverend Trask comes to Collinwood, with his daughter, Charity, invited by Judith. Judith tells him the stipulations on Edith's will, and Trask does his best to hide his disappointment. They cannot hope to have Jamison or Nora as pupils either – not yet.

Judith hopes that by their presence, they might make Edward relent. And she tells him that they are always welcome at Collinwood.

Trask asks Judith if he can leave his daughter with Judith, to keep watch over her. "For she has made an unfortunate attachment to an unworthy man". Judith agrees, and says that she will not let Charity out of her sight.

Roxanne greets Charity and is reproved by Judith. "You are not to contaminate her with your Godless ideas, Miss Drew."

As he rises Barnabas is greeted by Peterson, who ask his help. Charity is in Collinwood, and he cannot get to her, but he knows that Barnabas can get through walls. Can he deliver a note to Charity? Barnabas agrees, wondering what relationship these Trasks have with the one he met in 1785.

"We want to run away and get married" Peterson says.

Barnabas wonders if Peterson is a fortune hunter. He remembers Nathan Forbes, and how it turned out. Peterson assures him that he does not care if Trask disinherits Charity.

Barnabas has no trouble reaching Charity in his room. He bites her, and as she reacts, he gives her Peterson's note, and says that plans are being made for an elopment. Charity is enthusiastic about the idea and comes up with ideas of her own.


	98. Quentin's curse XIII

Barnabas has Magda and Sandor provide a diversion, by making a big show, and getting Judith and Edward angry enough that they are setting up a carnival on the grounds. With that going on, Charity will haves no trouble slipping away, with the aid of Beth (compelled by Barnabas) where Peterson is waiting to drive her to the justice of the peace.

As Barnabas goes to retire for the day he sees Angelique "have you not caused me enough grief"? He asks her.

"I have come to help you. I want to show you that I mean well. Maybe even deserve your love."

Barnabas is wary of her, and does not tell her anything. Once Charity is married, and Tony Peterson will be born later on, he will worry about the problem of Jenny. The most important thing is not to let Magda know that her sister is alive. He suspects that Magda might be the one who cursed Quentin once she learns how her sister was driven mad.. Maybe he should have Jenny sent away...

As he lies down, he thinks again of Nathan Forbes and how he helped him elope. Has he made a mistake? No, Charity is Tony Peterson's great grandmother and she MUST be married to a Peterson. Make sure that history does not change except for what needs to be changed.


	99. Quentin's curse XIV

The next day, as planned, Sandor and Magda put out their carnival to the merriment of the village children and the anger of Edward and Judith.

As predicted, they get too busy getting the carnival out, so they do not see Charity sneak out and get into the carriage with Peterson.

They are also too busy to notice that Jenny has opened the lock using her hairpin, and has escaped her room. She finds a knife and hides in the shadows.

When Quentin goes up the stairs, she attacks him with the knife. He manages to get out of the way, and Jenny falls down the stairs, breaking her neck.

When Judith come back followed by the protesting Magda, they find the dead Jenny with Quentin standing over her.

"She tried to kill me" Quentin explains.

"You told me that she had died away. But she was here." Magda says angrily. "What happened to her?  
"

"When I left her she was OK" Quentin says.

"You left her?"

"She bored me."

Judith tell Magda not to make any complaint "I am a Collins and respected here. You are nothing but a gypsy that makes her living by telling lies"

Magda looks at her. "I will not go to the police" she says . And adds, to herself. "I can get my own revenge."


	100. Quentin's curse XV

Magda mutters that she will get justice against the Collinses, one way or another.

"They were too ashamed of a gypsy in the family. Well, I will give them somehing worse to be ashamed of."

She gathers crystals and herbs and drops blood over them. "Retribution comes in the form of the wolf that walks like a man. May he and his children pay!"

Barnabas has risen and is about to go to Collinwood when he is stopped by Reverend Trask who blames him for his daughter's elopment.

"I know nothing about it, why ask me?"

"You are in cahoots with Peterson."

"I hired Peterson for my business transactions. I have no other relationship with him."

"Why don't I believe you?"

"Because you like to blame others for your own failings."

Finally Barnabas can shake off Trask and goes to Collinwood where he learns of what happened to Jenny. With a cold premonition, he goes to see Magda, but it is too late. She has already cursed Quentin and his descendants.

Fury sizes him when he understand what she has done and is about to tear her apart when both Josette and Sarah appear to him, and beg him not to let Olajuwon push him into another killing.

With an effort he controls himself and faces Magda. "You fool. You cursed Jenny's children"


	101. Laura -1897 I

Magda says that she knows of a way to lift the curse off Quentin.

"Please do before the full moon" Barnabas says.

She says that it will be a few days before she comes back but she hopes to be back before then. Barnabas sighs and says that he will have to wait. He also says that in case she fails she needs to tell Beth how to protect the children as they grow up.

As Magda leaves Barnabas knows that all he can do is wait, and to be ready to stop Quentin from going on a rampage if Magda does not return in time... So he just hangs around, and keeps meeting Roxanne.

In the meantime Edward receives a letter from Lady Kitty Hampshire and he answers by inviting her to come to Collinwood. Quentin notices it and mocks him.

"Are you going to make her believe that you are the Master of Collinwood so that you can marry her and get your hand on her money?"

Edward gets huffy and tells Quentin that he is not qualified to make moral judgements."

"I do not pretend to be virtuous, dear brother. Look at you all prim and proper. No one would know of your shady dealings."

"Just because I made some unwise investments."

"That's not what Laura told me"

"I forbid you to say her name"

Quentin laughs and goes back to Nicholas, to see if he can soften Judith's heart towards him, and have her raise his allowance.

In the meantime Laura Collins is driving back towards Collinsport. "Soon, Jamison" she says.


	102. Laura 1897 II

Barnabas notes that Magda has not yet returned, and that the full moon is approaching. If Magda does not get back in time, Quentin will transform, and he, Barnabas, might rise too late to keep him safe.

He realizes how alone he is. Magda and Sandor are gone, and so is Peterson and his new wife, Charity. He can only count on two persons in the inside, Beth, and she may soon lose her position as she no longer needs to care for Jenny, and Roxanne, who has been commanded not to "meddle in what is none of her business". He has other people in the village but he knows that they are not likely to be received by the family. Most importantly none of them could control a werewolf on a rampage – they would just get killed.

Wincing inwardly he goes and ask Angelique for help. She is overjoyed to hear that, and promises to keep Quentin safe. She only asks that he returns her love.

"That love was a lie." he tells her. "You just cast a spell on me."

"You can make it true, if you wish it."

The full moon rises and Quentin transforms. He rises growling as a white mist forms in front of him. Chasing it, he jumps through the windown and races away. He passes several people but does not notice them, as he follows the mist. Then, once in the woods, he meets a bear, and the two grapple.

Angelique watches, smiling. Barnabas will be grateful to her, she thinks.


	103. Laura 1897 III

Angelique talks to a will-of-the-wisp, and gives her a valuable fae jewel in exchange for her luring the werewolf away during the nights of the full moon.

Edward goes to Nicholas who he says "I have heard that you solve problems" He tells him that his wife, Laura is coming back.

"And it might interfere with you courting Lady Hampshire." Nicholas says.

"You can make her disappear"

"I might, but the price will be high. I do not come cheap. And you do not have the money"

"If I marry Lady Hampshire I will"

"Talk to your wife first. You may arrange a divorce, and it will probably cost you less than I will"

He talks to Angelique who tells him that Quentin has become a werewolf.

"Well, that is is problem. I find werewolves tiresome. They can be useful, but only under control. I do not think that Quentin would take well to being controlled."

"But he is your friend"

"He is a client. One that does not have enough money to afford me anymore."

He tells her to forget about Quentin.

Trask comes to Nicholas, and bemoans that Edith's will keeps him from getting his hands on the Collins money.

"But if you married Judith you'd be able to spend it as you wishes, if you were careful about it."

"I am married already."

"And wives can be removed for a price." Nicholas says.

"I cannot believe that I am agreeing to this unChristian thing."

"Please, Reverend, save the speeches for your deluded followers. I know what you are and you know that I know."

When Barnabas rises, Angelique tells him of the will-of-the-wisp. Barnabas regrets that he won't be able to talk to Quentin until the full moon is past.

"At least he will be safe." he says. "And I can find more information about Laura, who is the bigger threat"

They are interrupted by Nicholas who thunders at Angelique.

"Didn't I tell you to forget about Quentin? Why are you disobeying me?"

Angelique protests, but Nicholas drags her away. Barnabas tries to come to her aid, but Nicholas gestures and freezes him.

"I cannot destroy you" he says "but I can keep you from interfering with my business" He captures him inside a crystal and drives the crystal into a cave

"You will remain locked there for a while. I do not think that Olajuwon would mind if you suffer a bit more."


	104. Laura 1897- IV

Captured in Nicholas' crystal Barnabas tries to send out distress signals to Julia and Stokes. Back at the the present, his body begins to move his fingers, but neither Julia nor Stokes seem to notice.

Nicholas notices the will-of-the-wisp. He would like to command her to stop protecting Quentin, but he things that Quentin might be useful later. He hatches a plan to get rid of Minerva, Trask's wife.

Laura arrives at Collinwood, greeting Edward glacially.

"I will sign any papers you want me to, but undner my conditions. I will see my children, and if I will never see them again, I must make proper goodbyes".

Edward considers it a cheap way to get rid of her and recalls Nicholas' advice that getting rid of her by violent means might be more expensive – specially since Quentin might blackmail him for it later.

Quentin – who has not yet been told of what is happening to him – is shocked to see her.

"But you are dead." he blurts out. "I saw you die".

"You saw what I wanted you to see."


	105. Laura 1897 - V

Barnabas tries desperately to contact Julia and Stokes in the present. His body begins making sounds in his throat and he manages to move his fingers, but neither Julia nor Stokes notices.

Quentin faces Laura. "I know that you are not human." he says

"What gave you that idea?"

"You survived that fall when you should have died."

"A branch caught me on the way down"

"I also read your papers."

"That was not a nice thing to do."

"I thought you were dead. In any case, I found too many references to Ra and to the Benben Bird, and about the rite of sacrifice"

Laura laughs "And because of that?"

"I asked more about the Benben Bird, or Phoenix. I asked Nicholas and he told me what you are about."

"And what is that?"

"You are a Phoenix."

"And I can burn you alive then?"

Quentin stares at her. "Stay away from Nora. I know what you want to do to her."

"Nora is my child. You cannot keep me away from my child".

Trask tells his wife that both of them have been invited over to dine at the Collins' estate.

"And you think that Judith will make you a large donation?"

"She might. You must charm her."

Quentin talks to Nicholas who does not seem to be interested. "I advice you not to tangle with the Benben bird."

"You could help me."

"You cannot pay me enough for that."

"Is it all money? How about curiosity?"

"My curiosity about the Benben bird does not extend to methods of destroying it."

"At least give me information."

Nicholas shurgs and gives him a book. "Go get yourself killed then if you insist."

Julia recognizes that Barnabas' fingers are tapping the word SOS in Morse. She and Stokes view the past to see what happened to him. They see him a prisoner in Nicholas' trap.

"I have to get him out. I will go into Magda again" Julia says.

She projects herself into Magda's body and finds herself next to the body of Sandor, clutching a mummified hand to her bosom, miles from Collinsport.


	106. Laura 1897- VI

As Barnabas struggles to break free of Nicholas' prison, Julia, in Magda's body knows that she has to escape whoever killed Sandor and get to Collinsport, though she finds it difficult to orient herself as most of the familiar landmarks are not there. She finds refuge in an abandoned cottage, and manages to dig out some roots to eat. She also makes herself a tea of leaves which she recognizes as medicinal.

She looks at the mummified hand she carries, and which has gotten Magda in trouble...

If she only knew what to do.

Beth confronts Quentin and almost blurts out that he is now a werewolf, but catches herself in time. She sees Mrs. Filmore and tells her that the children might need to take precautions as they grow up.

Minerva Trask comes to Collinwood, and is welcomed by Judith, even though Minerva is suspicious of her husband's interest in her.

"Does she really know you?" she asks her husband.

As night is about to fall, Nicholas summons the will-of-the-wisp that Angelique put in charge of Quentin. He tells her that she is released from her obligation, and can go. The will-of-the-wisp leaves and Nicholas sits to watch.

In due time Quentin transfomrs, just as Minerva Trask goes out to get the air (or rather to escape the spectacle of Trask hovering over Judith). Minerva walks into the garden, and Quentin catches up to her.

Quentin kills her and runs away.


	107. Laura 1897- VII

Barnabas is still trapped, and Julia is lost, trying to orient herself.

In the meantime Quentin awakes covered in blood – as he did other times. When he goes down he hears that Minerva Trask has been killed by some animal. He notices Beth's reaction to him, and corners her, go get her to tell him what she knows.

This time, Beth tells the whole story. Magda has cursed him to be a werewolf. Barnabas said that there was a cure, but it is not here yet. He was supposed to be under control, but something happened. She also tells him that he has two children with Jenny, and it is for the sake of those children that Magda agreed to fin a cure for the curse he laid on him.

"And tomorrow I will kill again." he says.

Beth points out that the full moon is over, and there will be no danger until then. By then Magda will be back and it will all be over.

"By the way why is Barnabas in this?"

"He has his reasons. You will have to ask him. When he comes back."

Quentin sighs. Nothing to do until then.

But he can do something about Laura.

He tells Beth what he knows about her. That is is an inmortal phoenix that keeps marrying into the Collins family.

"She was the mother of our ancestor Daniel Collins. She died in a fire, with ther daughter, Daniel's sister. I found out that she carries out the rite to confer part of her power to her son by the sacrifice of the daugher. The idea is to keep breeding into the same family until a son is born who truly is a full fledged phoenix, a male phoenix that she can mate with."

"And she wants to sacrifice Nora."

"Yes.

"We must take her away."

"It will not help, she will find her again. No we need to defeat her. To destroy her. And I think I found out how."

Dirk Wilkins spies on them, and then reports to Laura.

"So Quentin Collins seeks to thwart me. I doubt that he will succeed." She embraces Dirk. "Hold me Dirk. When the sun does not shine I need your warmth."


	108. Laura 1897 VIII

As Julia tries to find her way, she sees Josette, who guides her, and gives cryptic warnings about the dessicated hand she carries.

"It is powerful, but not everyone knows how to contain its power"

Quentin tells Beth that Laura is a creature of the Sun, and that darkness is her enemy. Without the sun, she may die of cold. He tells her that his ritual will create an eclipse in front of her, keeping the sun from her. Also must make sure that she does not get close to a fireplace.

Laura is talking to Jamison and Nora, tellling them of the glories of Egypt.

"I might take you there, to see those wonders" she says.

She is suddenly struck with cold, but as she goes to the fireplace, the flames die down. "The Eclipse spell" she mutters. She races out trying to find some heat, and comes across Dirk Wilkins. She embraces him, taking in his heat. She ask him for hot tea and blankets.

"I am peforming the ritual tonight" she says "Whoever is putting his spell will think me dead. I have to survive until then."

Quentil keeps talking to Beth. She explains that Laura sacrifices the daughter to the son, and that she plans to marry Jamison's son again. "We are an eugenics project for her."

"And you know this..."

"I know how to ask questions, and never believe that anything is impossible. She will be weak, if not dead , by sundown, and I will put an end to her then"

Laura sees this in the cup of hot tea she is drinking. She asks the tea to show her Quentin's weakness, and she sees him changing to a wolf.

"Well, Quentin, you feel safe because the full moon is past. But you are wrong. I will not die. You will"

Julia has reached Nicholas Blair's cottage, led by Josette. "Let him have the hand." she says.


	109. Laura 1897 - IX

Laura tells Edward that she will give a little party for Jamison and Nora, and then she will leave. "You will never see me again, and will be free to marry Lady Hampshire"

Once alone, she calls on Ra, the Sun God, and asks him to tell his sister, the moon, to put all her power into awakening Quentin's beast during the night.

Julia reaches Nicholas' cottage. She knocks at the door, and says to him that she has something to sell him.

Coached by Josette, she shows Petofi's hand to Nicholas whose eyes sparkle

"Is it the real hand?" he asks.

He gives him all she asks, without haggling, but when Julia gives it to him, the hand attacks him, choking him.

"Oops. It can only be held by a gypsy." Julia says.

She leaves him and, following Josette's instructions, she breaks the spells on both Barnabas and Angelique. She manages to tell Angelique who she is, and why she came, and then faints.

When she wakes up, she is Magda again, surprised to find herself there. Magda gets the hand back, looks upon Nicholas with curiosity, but shrugs. None of her business. She races back to Collinwood.

Julia opens her eyes and sees Barnabas sitting in front of the I Ching. She turns to Stokes, but in the middle of her sentence, Stokes isn't there anymore. She looks out of the window, and Collinwood is normal, there is no fire...

And there is a set of memories in her...confusing memories...

Did we succeed? She asks herself. She goes out to Collinwood to find out what is going on...


	110. Laura 1897 - X

As Julia moves away, she freezes, suspended in time, and we are back in 1897

Angelique calls upon the will of the wisp and commands her again to lure Quentin. The will-of-the wisp refuses, because Nicholas broke her bond with Angelique.

Angelique sighs "if you want something done right, you have to do it yourself" she says.

Laura is calling on the power of the Sun and the Moon, certain that their powercombined will destroy Quentin.

We see Quentin again, ready to go face Laura, and they doubling in pain, as Beth watches horrified.

Laura has put Nora under her spell, and made her lie down by the fireplace.

"She will give you your strenght now, Jamison." she says "And you will become stronger and stronger. As your children will."

Quentin is about to lunge at Beth when a lighting ball comes in front of his eyes, paralyzing him. "You will remain as you are now." Angelique commands.

Barnabas crashes in Laura's ceremony, grabbing Nora and taking her away. "No!" Laura shouts. Barnabas recites the words of the banishment spell and Laura cannot touch him. She commands Dirk to attack Barnabas, and Dirk does, but Barnabas pushes him away. Laura screams as she catches fire. Hoping that he remembers the right words. Barnabas recites the spell of sealing. He hopes that with it she won't return, and that both Jamison and David might have normal lives. And that Nora might grow up too.

He wonders if he is changing the course of history too much, and what will he find when he returns to the present.


	111. Barnabas unmasked I

While Barnabas and Angelique deal with Laura and Quentin, Magda comes to, and is surprised to find herself in Blair's cottage. She clutches the hand to herself, and looks around.

She notices something glistening, and finds a gem studded necklace that she pockets. She looks at the unconscious Blair and comments "you won't be needing this, I think."

No sooner has Barnabas calmed the children and put them to bed that he is accosted by Dirk Wilkins.

"Bring her back!" Wilkins commands "

She won't be back, and you'll be better for it."

"I know what you are!"

Wilkins begins to shout, and Barnabas decides to put him under his control. He feeds off him and releases him. Wilkins collapses, to Barnabas' surprise as he only took enough to keep him under control. He takes his pulse and it is thready.

There is a chance that Wilkins might die and rise again...

He takes Wilkins to the Old House, and hopes that Magda is back.

She is, and between the two of them they hide him in a secret room behind the bookcase.

"He might die and then..."

"Then I will have to deal with him, and I hope he will listen"

It is going to be dawn soon and Barnabas has to leave to his hideout. Magda remains to watch over Wilkins.

In the meantime Charity comes back with her husband to attend her mother's funeral.


	112. Barnabas unmasked II

As Magda watches the dying Wilkins, Carl comes back, bringing his "fiance" Pansy Faye who loses no time scandalizing Edward and Judith.

Quentin thinks that she is a hoot, and congratulates Carl on getting him such a pretty sister-in-law.

Pansy does her mind reading act, prompting Edward to make a nasty comment about her being worse than the gypsies at the Old House. That comment arouses Pansy's curiosity, who wants to meet Magda and compare tarot decks.

Judith loudly forbids Carl from marrying her, but Carl mocks her saying that she cannot disinherit him, as Grandma Edith saw to it.

Edward sighs and wonders how long it will be until she runs off with Quentin, just as Laura did. Well, it is no skin off his nose, as he is now a widower, and can court Lady Hampshire to his heart content.

Pansy calls on Magda, who is a bit taken aback by this blonde lady who claims "spiritual kinship" with her. She is about to kick her out, when she hears steps behind her.

It is Dirk Wilkins.

"You should be resting" she tells him. "You are sick."

"I am not sick, I am dead!" Wilkins says, baring his fangs.

"It is daytime..." she manages to say.

"Do you think that Ra would harm His servant?" he asks mockingly. "Barnabas might have given me fangs and thirst, but I need not fear the sun."

Pansy screams, and Dirk falls on her, tearing her apart.

"I was hungry" he says to Magda, who is trying to get a makeshift stake. "And now you..."

But as he lunges he screams in pain. Magda pulls out of her pocket the amulet she stole from Blair and brandishes it. Dirk vanishes, screaming "Barnabas will pay for what he did to Laura!"


	113. Barnabas umasked III

Carl wonders when Pansy will come back, and goes looking for her. He hears her voice and follows it to the East Wing where he is puzzled that she would go to where there are only empty rooms. He steps into one of those rooms while still hearing her voice.

Then the room changes and he is faced with Pansy, dressed demurely, next to Trask who is dressed as a butler. "Who are you?" Pansy shouts at him.

Judith is remonstrating with Roxanne Drew for what she calls "lack of proper respect" for Trask Roxanne apologizes, though by her posture she is not very sorry. Judith threatens to fire her, and Roxanne tells her to have Edward do it as it is him that employs her. "You are too sassy for a servant, girl" Judith says.

Dirk Wilkins materializes in front of them. They react to him, but he casts his influence over both of them. "Well, my employer," he says pulling Judith to him "Now you will serve me." He feeds on her and releases her. Then he turns to Roxanne "And you look so horrified" he says "But you were not horrified when Barnabas did this to you, didn't you?" He feeds off her and releases her too.

"Soon it will be night, and Barnabas will arise. He will come here and do what I ask. If he wants you to live." He hands Judith a pistol, and tells her to use it when the clock chimes midnight or when he commands her.


	114. Barnabas unmasked IV

Nora tries to get into the Old House to play – as she has done other times, having Magda show her the cards and try to read the future, but Magda, desperate to get rid of Pansy's body cannot let her in.

To get rid of her, she gives her a new trinket, the jewel that she took from Nicholas, askiing her to hide it from her family (sure that she can retrieve it later).

As Nora takes it, her expression changes. "Yes" she says "I will do it".

When Barnabas arises, he is given an ultimatum by Dirk. Either he brings back Laura or Roxanne dies.

Barnabas senses Roxanne's presence and goes to her. He finds her unharmed, next to Judith and is relieved. Then Dirk comes behind him.

"Will you bring Laura back?" he asks.

"You are better off without her."

Dirk then gives his command and Judith shoots Roxanne.

Distraught, Barnabas attacks Dirk, and between the shouts, and the shot, Quentin, Edward, and Trask come and witness Barnabas taking Dirk apart, while Judith stands there, stunned, the gun at her hand.

When Barnabas finishes with Dirk, he sees the whole family looking at him with horror, and he vanishes, understanding that now everyone knows what he is.


	115. Note on first half of 1895

The first half of 1876 shows the problem of trying to force an artistic form into a different one. Basically turning a gothic novel into a sopa opera, that is, turning a close ended form into an open ended for. A gothic posits a problem,or a mystery that reaches a conclusion in the last chapter, and after that, the characteres, the ones still alive, lead uneventful lives, with no more being written about them. A soap opera, the characters have to go on, and face new problems, and seem to be unable to learn from their mistakes. That's why love stories, no matter how deep and emotionally satisfying never lead to a happy ever after.

(They solved that problem by bringing in Count Petofi, so I am not going to complain too loudly... I LOVE the Count)

So, after solving the Laura problem, so that it makes sense that Barnabas goes back in time to stop her, I had to deal with the transition to the second half. And that has to do with the killings. Yes, Sandor can go, he is a minor character, and so Minerva, who just shows up to be killed. Dirk Wilkins' death is part of the arc that leads to the unmasking of Barnabas, so we are getting a whole lot of story out of a secondary character, so he can go, having served his purpose.

That leaves Rachel (here replaced by Roxanne Drew) and Carl. I believe that there is more story to them, or at least serve as teasers for future stories. Roxanne might come back, later in the present, which means more story. And Carl, his fate serve as foreshadowing for the Parallel Time story (yes, he stepped into that room).

In fact Rachel's and Carl's deaths were not needed for the story, but were a quick decision due to the actors wanting to go away for a while. And it led to the belief that Barnabas was an easy disposal system for characters whose actors are away. Not story driven, but expediency driven.

Well, since I have no expediency of that kind, I can rewrite those exits in ways that promise more.


	116. Barnabas unmasked V

The hunt starts for Barnabas, as Trask, after commiserating with Judith, lets her seek to comfort him "in his loss"

Roxanne hovers near death, and the doctor who was called in, says that she will not last much longer, that the damage is too great.

When Barnabas arises he is met by Angelique who puts him up to speed on what is going on

"It does not help that Carl and Pansy have disappeared."

"I know what happened to Pansy, but him?"

"Seems as Earth has swallowed him."

He wants to see Roxanne, but she tells him that first, everyone is hunting for him, and second, that there is a great possibility that Roxanne will rise again as a vampire, too."

"And then, she will be hunted too."

"It should not happen". "

It will not. Do not forget, we fae are good at illusion. I will create and illusion of her dead body and bring her to a safe place"

"I must see her."

"She needs to know how to survive, and she needs to know that she must leave Collinsport"

"I can teach her."

"You do not HAVE the time to do all that, escape the hunters, and try to help Quentin... Magda still has the hand, doesn't she?" "

Yes."

"Well, let her try using it. As for you I am going to create an illusion for you."

Peterson is berated for bringing in a vampire to town, even though he protests that he only met him in Collinsport and he never suspected what he was.

"But he helped you elope with your wife"

"I do not know why he did it. Maybe he wanted me gone and not asking questions..."

Nora sits, looking entranced at the medallion she got from Magda. Beth surprises her, and when she does, Nora rises and flashes the medallion on her face. "You must serve him, too.


	117. Count Petofi I

Roxanne awakens and Angelique greets her with the news that she has to leave Collinsport and learn how to live a different life.

"I will give you the knowledge you need so that you can survive. But you must leave because they are hunting vampires now, and they might catch you."

Barnabas tries to see her, but Olajuwon bars the way. "You may not tell her goodbye, anymore than slaves could say goodbye to their loved ones when they were sold away" "

How long will you torment me?"

"How long did your family torment thus thousands of men women and children?"

"It is unfair. Why should I be the one to pay?"

"What has fairness to do with the slave trade?"

In Nicholas Blair's cottage, Nicholas is slowly recovering from the paralysis the hand inflicted on him. He gets up and finds two men digging through his effects. "Some nice stuff here, Aristide" one of them says "But too much worthless stuff. Powerful maybe, but without discernet."

Aristide looks bored "Does he have any gold or silver?"

"Gold! What a fool you are, my boy, easily distracted by pretty baubles. No, Gold is the least valuable thing here."

Nicholas gets up "Leave here you two!" he commands them, while tryig to freeze them with a gesture.

He faces the bigger man. "So, Count Petofi, you have become a scavenger?"

"An antiquarian and archeologist. Looking for valuable things in the rubble."

"I do not take kindly to thieves." Nicholas says and intones a spell than sends Petofi into convulsions.

"I am not so helpless, Petofi" he says.

He is interrupted when Aristide throws a knife into his back. He turns, angrily and throws Aristide against the wall.

"You think that you can kill me with that you fool?"

But he is distracted and Petofi strikes back, making him evaporate.

"It will be a while until he reforms." Petofi says. "Well, done Aristide. You reminded me why I keep you around in spite of all your failings. That, and your pretty face, too."

Nora and Beth go out into the night. "We must find him." Nora says. "He needs us."


	118. Count Petofi II

As Nora and Beth kneel on the ground a spirit comes to them.

"Why waste your time worshipping me, you fools? Bring a shovel and dig my body. But first find my head!"

"Where is it?"

"Find my head!"

Barnabas and Angelique talk. She tells him that Roxanne left Collinwood.

"How will she manage?"

"I let her have all the knowledge she needs. I put it all in her mind, so she know what to do. She will do better than you, since she does not have Olajuwon to ride her"

Barnabas is surprised that she is so helpful now, remembering the grief she put him through once.

"I was told that you would hate me if I continued that way, and shown your face with your eyes full of hatred."

"And..."

"And it was very painful to me. Is this what you humans call having a conscience?"

"It might be. Fear of disapproval of someone we cherish.."

She looks at him longingly "Did you ever love me?"

"It was an illusion."

"If it was not for the spell, would you have loved me?"

"I do not know. I might... I might not. You cannot tell who you will love."

Trask has harsh words with Peterson, and accuses him of helping the vampire. Peterson denies it heatedly, saying that he was deceived, as everybody else. They are interrupted when they see Charity move in a daze towards the door. They talk to her, but she does not respond. She opens the door and goes out into the night.

They follow her, but it is dark and cannot find her. They call her and ask for help. Finally they track he down. They catch up with her, at dawn, by a crypt in the cemetery. She is dazed, and has fresh wounds in her throat. They open the crypt and find Barnabas in the coffin. Quickly Trask and Peterson sharpen a stake and drive it through Barnabas' heart.


	119. Count Petofi III

Petofi and Aristide talk. Aristide says that he heard that a vampire was staked recently.

"And what happened to its body?" asks Petofi.

"Seems it turned to dust."

"Old vampire, then... but vampire dust is still poweful. Find where it was and I will go collect it."

Aristide asks when they will leave.

"Leave? This place might well be a treasure trove of artifacts, not even counting all we got from that Blair sorcerer. I believe that a lot of things can be found here."

Aristide grumbles that the town is no fun.

"Life is not all fun and games, my dear boy. Too bad that you cannot understand the pleasures of scholarship... but then, you would put frown lines in that beautiful face of yours."

Amy and Beth talk and say that they cannot think where the head might be. Not even if it is in Collinsport.

"We can give him another head, and he can go look for it."

"Where can we find a head?"

"A pumpkin might do" Amy says. "if a pumpkin can turn into a carriage, it can also turn into a head."

Magda and Quentin talk about how to make the hand do what it is supposed to do.

"I take it that when you stole it, you did not take the instructions too." Quentin says mockingly.

"Sandor died to get this to you. You should speak more respectfully."

"This is all your fault you know."

"It is yours. You earned your curse. If it was not for Jenny's children I would not bother with you."

Quentin laments that with Barnabas dead they have no one to help them.

Then Barnabas appears next to them


	120. Count Petofi IV

Barnabas explains that with the help of Angelique's illusions he faked his death, so as to stop the hunt for him.

"Now I can concentrate in getting rid of Quentin's curse"

Magda laments that she cannot figure out how to work the hand. But she think that she can do it, with a bit more time.

Barnabas sighs, and asks that Angelique should try to use the hand, to see if she has better results.

"This hand can only be used by a gypsy, anyone else, the hand turns against the used" Magda informs him.

Beth and Amy place the pumpkin on the headless skeleton, which risies immediately and grows flesh over the bones (and also fabric to make clothes for it)

"This is not my head!" the newly resurrected man complains.

"We cannot find it, master." Beth explains "This is the best we could do." The man backhands her and Nora, making them bleed.

He closes his hand on their blood rubbing it against the pumpking that serves for a head, thus creating an illusion of a human head.

"I will now go get myself a head. I will deal with you later."

Petofi finds the coffin where Barnabas was supposedly staked. He tries to gather the dust, but then realizes that it is only fairy dust.

"An illusions, that was it! The vampire is still alive. But not for long. I WILL get its dust!"

The newly resurrected man stalks a villager and cuts off its head. It tries to place it over his own neck, but it will not stay. "Not my head... not my head... I have to find my own head."


	121. Count Petofi V

Petofi and Aristide find Barnabas in his coffin, as they approach they are confronted by Olajuwon who informs him that the vampire is his to do as he wishes, and that they should not intefere. Petofi bows to it, asking only for permission to take blood out of Barnabas. Olajuwon gives permission, and Petofi collects a couple of vials.

"He's gonna be hungry when he wakes up" he says.

At Collinwood they are distraught over the news of the beheaded man.

"If I did not know that Barnabas was dead, I would think this is his doing" Edward laments.

Quentin says that Barnabas never beheaded anyone, and that it must be something else.

He says that Edward's concern has more to do with his being afraid that Lady Hampshire would decide it is too scary to come. "And there go your prospects, brother dear:

They are interrupted by Trask and Judith who announce they have been married.

Edward protests and Quentin thinks it funny.

"Why do you care, brother? Jamison is still the heir, and you still get your allowance. And if Lady Hampshire takes a shine to you, then you are set and need not worry."

"But Trask...but Trask... but..."

"Yeah, a fortune hunter, but he has to understand the terms of the will, that Judith is only the administrator for Jamison and Nora."

"He can still steal"

"Which is why you should talk to a lawyer about getting a regular audit. You do it brother, you are better at dealing with lawyer types. I cannot look at one without laughing."

Aristide asks Petofi why he did not challenge Olajuwon.

"Dear boy, dealing with a dedicated spirit is not an easy task. It takes a lot of energy to defeat one, and what would I gain? Some vampire dust... There are other vampires out there who are not protected. And anyway, vampire blood is more potent than dust, and I got it."

Aristide wants to know when they are going back and leaving this one horse town.

"When I am convince htat there is no more for us, dear boy. And if you get bored, what about expanding your knowledge? Reading will NOT give you frown lines"

Nora sleeps, clutching the jewel in her hand. She holds it so tight that she cuts herself and her blood covers it. We hear the headless man voice "You are mine, Nora Collins. You and your descendants.!"


	122. Count Petofi VI

Barnabas wonders about the decapitated man. Was this something that happened in the original timeline, or is it an effect of his going back in time? And if so, how many things has he inadvertently changed?

Not to mention that the killer is being hunted, and in the hunt, the searchers might come upon his coffin, the real one this time...

He better check out what is going on. It is a while away to the next full moon, and Magda has time to figure out what to do...

If not, he will go to the tribe and offer to bargain the return of the hand for Quentin's cure.

Nora is outside, with Beth. She sits at the edge of the road and pretends to cry.

Aristide and Petofi hear it, and Petofi orders Aristide to check it out, while he stays behind, "for it might be a trap". Aristide comes to the weeping Nora, and relaxes his guard. "Only a lost child" he shouts to Petofi.

Petofi nods but does not come closer. Aristide talks to Nora, and asks her if she is lost. Nora contitnue to sob, and asks Aristide to help her.

As Aristide takes her hand, the headless man bursts in, a cutlass in his hand. Aristide tries to take his own knife, but Nora grabs his hand and uses her weight to pull him down. Aristide struggles, but cannot stop the cutlass from coming closer to his throat.

Behind them, Petofi mutters the word of a spell, which causes the headless man to topple, the pumpkin that serves as its head rolls away.

"Yes, it WAS a trap" he says to Aristide.

He examines the headless body which is now turning again into a skeleton. "Do not bother, Judah Zachary" he says to the body. "Your head is miles away from here. It is, in fact in my cabinet, where it will stay. You cannot come back."

He turns to Nora, who has collapsed along with the body. "And here is the bait... Yes, innocence is the perfect bait. And what is this?" He notices the jewel that Nora has around her neck.

"Oh, yes, this is what happens when you let children play with objects of power. Well, it is in now in good hands" he pockets it "and there it will remain. And you, little girl" he turns to Nora. "Bettter get back home before your parents figure out what you have been up to."


	123. Count Petofi VII

Quentin talks to Beth, and tells him that he will be out of town a couple of days. She protests and tells him that curing his curse takes priority.

Quentin says that a) the full moon is not due for a couple of weeks yet and b) Magda is still trying to figure out how the hand works. He says that he worries as to what Trask might do.

Beth tells him that Edward is talking to a lawyer about it.

"Lawyer! Have you heard of Nathan Forbes, last century? No? Well, he married a cousin of the heir, and when a disaster struck that killed off the junior branch, he plotted to have the heir killed, so as to have his wife inherit"

"And you think?"

"Trask can kill Jamison, and force Nora to marry a man of his choice, with Judith going along. A lawyer cannot stop him. But I know who can."

Petofi and Aristide sit at the Blue Whale, Aristide bored, but Petofi enthusiastic as to what he collected.

"I might even find a unicorn here! They exist, dear boy."

"And unicorns love one horse towns..."

"Oh, those you call one horse town can be treasure troves for such as me. And..."

He stops and put his left hand on his right arm... "It could not be... No... Yes... Yes... It is calling its arm.. Aristide, my Hand is here!


	124. Count Petofi VIII

Petofi senses that his hand is near, "If there are no gypsies here, that means that it was stolen from them. And in that case the compact I made with them is null and void. I would not take it back from them, but I can take it back from the thief. Oh, Aristide, it was certainly luck that drove us to this one-horse town, as you call it."

He tries to follow it but suddenly the sensation goes away. "I guess that whoever tried to make it work gave up for today. But he or she will try again. And I will find it, and reclaim it."

In Collinwood the ghost of Pansy Faye is keens next to the room where Carl disappeared.

Amanda Harris meets Edward, to answer his request for a new governess. She carefully tells him what he wants to hear about religion and men like Trask. He hires her, grateful that the death of her predecessor has not scared her away.

Quentin comes hours later, seemingly drunk. Which earns him a reproof from Judith and Trask. He shrugs them off and leaves. Later he meets with Amanda and tries to ingratiate her with him, but she answers coolly that it is better that their relationship remain professional.

Never mix business with pleasure – and she has heard that it is unwise to love Quentin Collins.

He entreats her to watch for what Trask might do with Jameson.

"I told you, I will take care of Trask."

"And make it look like an accident" Quentin adds.


	125. Count Petofi IX

Charity and her husband Robert come to discuss Minerva's inheritance. and the share which should come directly to her, but Trask says that by running away she forfeited it. Charity is incensed that Trask has remarried so soon. There are heated words, and Judith tries to smooth things out, and invites them for dinner. Reluctantly Charity and Robert agree.

Petofi says that he senses that the hand might be in Collinwood, and wants to go in. Aristide wants to know how to introduce themseves.

"That would put us in danger of very boring conversations, as they tend to be conventional people. No, we will enter unnoticed, and spare ourselves from meeting them."

He gives Aristide a medal. "When you wear it people do not notice you."

"You mean that we are invisible?"

"No such thing. It is just that it makes people look away from you. They sense your presence, but that's it."

Petofi knocks at the door, and hides when the servant opens it.

He chuckles "You played this way when you were a kid?" he asks. He gestures and the door fails to lock. He chuckles again, and enters, with Aristide in tow.

"You see? They all look away. We do not exist for them. "

Pansy Faye begins weeping again, attracting the attention of Petofi, who goes to investigate. "Maybe this ghostly weeping will show us the way."

They follow her and see a scene in a richly furnished room, among other deserted room, where people identical to the ones they passed on the way up, are in the middle of a heated discussion.

"Carl" Pansy Faye bewails "You are lost to me. Will you come back?"


	126. Count Petofi X

Trask talks to Amanda who at first is curt with him but seem to warm up to him, confessing that she feels a great spiritual hunger... but one that she does not dare show her employers... for they do not understand.

Trask promises to give her guidance.

"But we must be discreet, for Mr. Edward might take it amiss, and dismiss me"

Trask leaves and behind him Amanda smiles. Now to choose the time and place... and wheter Amanda will fall off Widow's Hill and disappear before they ask her questions.

Charity hears the call of Pansy and is surprised that no one else hears it. She follows it, and there she faces the strange room. She turns and faces Petofi and Aristide.

"Who are you?" she demands.

Aristide takes out his knife ready to silence her, but Petofi stops her.

"No need, dear Aristide. There is a more amusing way." He gestures and his gesture encompasses both Charity and Pansy. "Go together, the two of you."

Charity is possessed by Pansy and goes down the stairs singing. She is met by the shocked family, and they wonder if she has gone mad, until Judith remembes the songgirl that Carl brought in.

"She must be possessed" she says. "My husband will know what to do."

Barnabas talks to the chief of the gypsy tribe, and says that he will return the hand if they remove Quentin's curse.


	127. Count Petofi XI

Petofi decides that the hand is not in Collinwood, that the vibrations from the strange room has misled them.

"But it is good to know it is there. We might need it to disappear after I reclaim my hand" He and Aristide go to the Old House.

Barnabas and King Johnny Romano go to the Old House, too. King Johnny wants to punish Magda for her theft, but Barnabas says that she is under his protection. King Johnny has to assent.

They come in, and meet Petofi as he is badgering Magda.

"You!" King Johnny says. "You lost your claim on that hand!"

"You could not guard it. Now it belongs to whom it finds first.."

King Johnny goes after him with his sword. "I will take your head then!"

As he moves, Aristide, who is hiding behind them, throws his knife and stabs King Johnny on the back. Barbabas turns around and grabs Aristide, as Petofi summons the hand.

The hand crashes out of the box it is held, and though a pane of glass. Barnabas watches, amazed, how it flies through the air, and then alights on Petofi's extended arm.

'It is mine! It is mine again!" Petofi shouts.


	128. Count Petofi XII

Barnabas attacks Petofi, but Petofi puts his hand on Barnabas' chest, and makes him double up with pain.

"Don't you know yet what this hand can do?' Petofi asks.

"I thank you for allowing me to regain my hand" he adds "and for that I will be merciful. You can live. But remember that I know that you are not dead, and can let others know."

Quentin and Beth arrive to see King Johnny dead and Barnabas writhing in pain. Barnabas tells them what happened. Beth is upset. "He cannot allow those innocent children to suffer." she says.

"There MUST be another way." Quentin says.

Beth is upset, and wonders what the children must be told as they grow up.

In the morning, she goes visit the children, and is upset to see them so cheerful and trusting. "I MUST do something."

0

Petofi and Aristide go back to Collinwood, once more slipping unnoticed. They watch amused as Charity does again her Pansy stage act, and tries to charm Edward to the dismay of Trask and Judith.

"Why are we coming here?'" Aristide asks

"Because of the room. The gypsies will come looking for the hand. I intend to go where they cannot follow me."

They stand inside the room, but it does not change. Petofi mutters and incantation and places his hand on the walls.

"Nothing. Whatever caused it to change is not doing it now. It might not do it again in years."

"So?"

"So we have to find another way."

Beth asks in town about .Petofi, describing him, and Aristide, and shel earns where he is staying.

She goes knocking at the door, and when Aristide answers the door, she tells him that Petofi MUST help Quentin, that there are innocent children involved. She begs for their help.

Aristide is intrigued, and asks her more about Quentin. He also notices the wounds on her throat.

"You must have met Barnabas Collins, I see."

"He is helping us. He came back to the past to help us".

"You mean that he is from the future?" Petofi asks, coming into the room.

"Yes. He came to prevent a tragedy"

"So he can travel through time." Petofi smiles. "And the future is a good place to hide."

He lets Beth in

"Does he tell you how?"

"He said nothing."

"Not to you, but to me, he will."

"If he does it, will you cure Quentin?" "We will bargain."

"I will tell him that you want to see him."

"No, I do not want him to come prepared nor to have him choosing the place. He WILL come to me."

"I will tell him."

"No, you will call him when he awakens and before he has the time to think." He smiles. "I know of the bond between a vampire and those he feeds upon. They can get very possessive when someone else threatens them, and this keeps them from thinking straight."

Aristide throws her on a chair and ties her up.

"He will come all right, tonight, because he will sense that someone is interfering with his source of blood. He will not think, he will act. And I will be ready."


	129. Count Petofi XIII

As dusk approaches, Petofi commands Aristide to put his knife againt Beth's throat.

"She is very much scared, and he will sense it. So he will be here soon."

Barnabas awakens and is aware of Beth's distress. Without thinking, he follows that fear, and so he faces Petofi in his lair.

He moves towards Beth, to release her, but Petofi stops him.

"You do not wish to feel my hand again."

"What has she done to you? Release her."

"Yes, you'd hate to see her blood spilled and going to waste. She has many years of feeding you in her, but if my friend's knife releases it, all you'd get at most is one bender."

"I want her released."

"She is not the only one with blood on her veins, you know. But then you vampires get so unreasonably attached to your food."

"What do you want?"

"The secret of time travel. I know that you came from the future and will return to it. I want to go to the future."

"Why?"

"It is no concern of yours."

"You want to escape the gypsies. Well, I am of no use to you. I did not move through time physically. Only my mind did. I have a body that has lasted far more than a normal lifespan, and I sent the mind from my body in the future, to my body in this present."

Petofi looks at him incredulously.

"You could go to the future, but that would mean leaving your present body behind. Leaving it for the gypsies to find out. And when your body dies, the body in the future will not exist."

Petofi roars. "You lie!"

But he knows it is true. Barnabas' secret of time is useless to him. Frustrated he gestures, and Aristide stabs Beth on the throat.

Barnabas races to her, but her carotid has been severed, and after a few seconds she dies.

Barnabas turns to Aristide, determined to tear him apart, but Petofi puts his hand on him and burns him with pain.

As Barnabas writhes on the ground Petofi tells him that while he will not kill him because Olajuwon will not like it, Olajuwon has no problem on inflicting pain on him.


	130. Count Petofi XIV

Barnabas is deeply upset over Beth's death. He had accepted his state as being one of "they feed you and you protect them" but not only he failed to protect Beth, but she died trying to help him.

He looks down at Widow's Hill, wondering what the point of it is, if Olajuwon will hand him defeat after defeat.

He is visited by Josette who tries reasoning with him, saying that Beth wanted to help Jenny's children, and even if he was not there, she would have tried to help them.

Petofi grumbles at his temper and at Aristide's readiness with the knife. By killing Beth they made an enemy of Barnabas, who will now try to destroy them. "And he can tell the gypsies where I am."

He realizes that there is another way. He summons Charles Delaware Tate to come to him.

The spirit of Charles Delaware Tate comes, wanting to know why he is being summoned. Petofi tells him that he has a portrait to paint.

"How? I cannot hold anything in my hands"

"For this you shall be able to."

"I want to move on. You promised me freedom after that other painting."

"Do you want your freedom or revenge on the one who murdered you, two years ago?"

Amanda finishes her lessons with Jamison and Nora, and goes back to her room, when she meets Tate's ghost "Amanda, why?" Tate asks.

"To be free."

"I created you!"

"I created myself You wanted a compliant doll, to fulfill your fantasies, but you were a better artist than you knew. I am a living, breathing woman!"

"Which did not exist before I painted her!"

"I chose my own path, and you were stifling me."

"You killed me!"

"You were killing me slowly. Just because you created me did not give you the right to command me as you did."

"You are not real. You are just my creation!"

Amanda is shaken by this encounter and begins to weep. "I am real! I am as much a person as anyone else!"

Quentin finds her weeping and begins to comfort her.

They end up in bed together.


	131. Count Petofi XV

Amanda confesses to Quentin that she is an artificial creation. Charles Delaware Tate painted what he thought was an ideal woman and she came to life out of the painting.

"And as long as nothing happens to that painting – and I keep it in a safe place - I will not age nor die. That's why I can do what I do."

Quentin is shaken by this, but then he takes it in stride.

"I am a werewolf, my cousin is a vampire, my sister-in-law was a fire demon. I am the last person to be shocked."

Amanda says that it is time she took care of Trask. There are compromising papers in Trask's possession, that once they come to light, will make Judith understand the man he is. She tells Quentin to look for them after she has done what she came to do.

Tate paints Quentin's portrait and presents it to Petofi.

"You promised me my freedom"

"I have to know if it does what it is supposed to do."

"It will"

"Then, be gone, and do not return till I summon you again"

Barnabas talks to Angelique who tells him that even if the curse cannot be lifted, it can be modified. But they have to be wary of Petofi and see that he does not do more damage.

It is then that the spirit of Beth Chavez comes to them and tells them "Find Garth Blackwood"


	132. Count Petofi XVI

Amanda decides to deal with Trask that day. She lures him towards Widow's Hill where she accuses him of trying to kill Jamison. Trask denies it, hotly, saying that she is insane, and that he will see that she is fired.

"But you are not the one who hired me. As for firing..." she fires her gun and shoots him dead. Then she screams and jumps off Widow's Hill.

(At the bottom, out of sight, as she cannot die or be hurt while her portrait exists, she gets into the water and swims away where Quentin has left her a boat with her payment)

Quentin loses no time rummaging Trask's papers, and finds the incriminating evidence (which Amanda forged as it was faster than uncovering it). He shows it to Edward, who agrees with him that they had a narrow escape. Edward says that Lady Hampshire is coming over to visit Collinwood. Quentin, who has his own sources, knows that Lady Hampshire is of reduced circumstances, and is looking for a rich husnbad, same as Edward is looking for a rich wife.

"With so much in common, I don't doubt that they will be very happy"

The moon is about to rise, and he sits alone, confident that Angelique will protect him as before. But the moon rises and he does not transform.

Beth comes to him "You are in great danger, Quentin"


	133. Count Petofi XVII

Quentin asks Beth what danger he is in, but he vanishes. He waits for the full moon, dreading what might happen.

The moon rises and he does not transform.

In his lair, Petofi looks at Quentin's portrait, how it transforms into a wolf, and he laughs.

"Yes, Quentin, tonight you will feel blessed, but two weeks from now..."

He sends Aristide to check on Collinwood, to see if there is a wolf that walks like a man.

Aristide protests that if the spell did not take full effect, he might be killed by Quentin "And Barnabas is there and he saw me kill his source of blood. He migh kill me."

"Or he might make you replace her as his source of blood. Maybe. Do you want to know what will happen to you, no maybe about it, if you do not obey me?"

Aristide blanches. "I will obey you" He says, and leaves.

Petofi looks again at the portrait. "Charles Delawere Tate you are a better painter dead than alive"


	134. Count Petofi XVIII

Barnabas is astonished that Quentin has not transformed. Quentin is just too happy to think what it might mean. "I am not going to look at a gift horse in the mouth"

They are interrupted by Charity, very much possessed by Pansy. Pansy stares at Barnabas... "You... you had something to do... that man..." For a moment she wavers and her expression changes to Charity's.

"Charity, is that you?" Barnabas ask.

"You... you are dead. I saw you being killed."

"It was a trick. I used you as bait. I am sorry."

Her expression changes again, and Barnabas gets hold of her. "Come back, Charity. Come back to us." He bites her and tries to get control of her that way.

"That man!" she shouts. "The one with the hand! And the pretty one with the knife!"

"Seems that Petofi did this to her." Barnabas says. "And I am afraid that if Petofi gave you this gift, it is not meant for good."

Aristide returns to Petofi, and says that there was no sign of the werewolf.

"Yes, it is working. There are a few more tests to run." He looks at Quentin's portrait. "Mr. Quentin Collins is going to have a few accidents, accidents that should leave marks on him. We will see then.


	135. Count Petofi XIX

Barnabas and Angelique try to determine what is behind Quentin's remission and also where Petofi might be hiding, because Petofi is using a spell to keep himself and Aristide from being noticed

Petofi tells Aristide of the spellr when Aristide complains that Barnabas might have found him

"And why didn't you tell me when you sent me?"

"Because you needed some disciplining, my boy"

Quentin is just happy that his curse seems to be gone, and does not mind how often he stumbles and hits his head on walls, or trips and falls.

As he walks the grounds he sees a woman approach. He goes to greet her and thus meets Lady Kitty Hampshire, who has come after Edward invited her.

He asks her sardonically whether she knows the terms of Grandma Edith's testament, and that Edward does not control the money.

"You would have better luck ingratiating yourself with my sister. So, pretend to be a pious widow, seeking spiritual solace."

Lady Hampshire pretends to laugh at this, but she is clearly discomfited. She will have to talk about it to Edward. She asks about Judith's marriage.

"I heard that she was widowed, not long after her marriage."

"Yeah, and good riddance to that fortune hunter."

In his lair Petofi looks at the portrait, how it shows the slowly healing cuts and bruises that Quentin should be showing in his body.


	136. Count Petofi XX

Barnabas talks to Angelique, telling her that he cannot find Petofi nor Aristide, but he knows that they are still around.

Angelique says that there is a spell that makes you unnoticeable. "people turn their heads away and refuse to see you".

She knows of a way to counteract it. At least inside Collinwood. "I will make sure that I either of them comes within a few yards of Collinwood, we will know it."

Kitty talks with Edward about his situation. She says that he might be able to contest the provisions that make Judith the administator of the fortune.

"She married a fortune hunter, didn't she?"

"Well, Trask was proven to be that. There is enough of proof of it."

"Shouldn't you talk to a lawyer then?"

"But then they will put another administrator, and he might be even less sympathetic to Quentin and me."

"That can be arranged"

Petofi senses the trap that Angelique has set for him.

"Can you defeat her?" Aristide asks.

"She is fae, and if you attack one of them, you might find facing the Courts, whether seelie or unseelie. You might trick one of them, and bind them with a geas. But fight one outright? I do not know enough of her to chance it."

"But there must be a way."

Petofi cannot approach Collinwood but can spy on it at a distance. He looks upon it and smiles "Why, Lady Katherine Hampshire is here. She owes me a favor. And we can be of use to each other."


	137. Count Petofi XXI

Petofi summons Kitty Hampshire, who is deligthed to see him again.

"I need your help." she tells him.

"So, having run through one husband's fortune, you seek another?"

She tells him how Judith controls the purse strings.

"But if she were removed for incompetence, we could have a more amenable administrator... The fact that she married that fortune hunter is a good reason to. But it would be better to have her go visibly mad."

Petofi likes how she think, and asks her to do a favor for him. Erase certain signs on the property that will allow him to escape detection. When she is done, he will give her a potion for Judith.

Kitty does as Petofi asks and erases the protection spells that Angelique had put there. Grateful Petofi gives her the potion.

"A few drops in her coffee, and she will go stark raving mad."

As she leaves, Petofi can now observe Quentin. He is alone, going up a staircase.

"Now, the big test. If he dies, he will be no good to me, anyway."

Quentin stumbles and falls. Petofi looks at the angle of his head

. "Yes, he broke his neck. He should be either dead or crippled"

He looks at the portrait and sees how the head is twisted at an angle. He looks again at Quentin, who is getting up, none the worse for wear.

"Yes!"


	138. Count Petofi XXII

Kitty pours a few drops of the liquid Petofi gave her in Judith's tea, and watches it take effect.

Judith sees suddenly her grandmother, who accuses her of betraying her by marrying Trask. She screams and defends herself. She then sees Trask who mocks her for being so foolish as to marry him.

Kitty tries to disguise her smile as she sees the first part of her plan come true. She then goes to see Peterson, and says to him that if he finds them someone that will be a more pliable adminitrator, he and Charity will be rewarded. "And Charity might need some caring, these days. Get me a good admnistrator, and we'll have a competency hearing for Judith"

Petofi sits on his armchair, with his eyes fixed on what Quentin is doing. He is now drinking alone in his room, waiting perhaps for Barnabas to show up. Petofi begins to mutter an invocation, while Aristide burns some leaves in a brazier.

Kitty is going to lie in bed, when she is confronted by Josette. "You will not be allowed to destroy the family" Josette tells her. Flames shoot from her hands, making Kitty run screaming.

Kitty runs away, chased by a monstruous looking Josette, until she comes to Widow's Hill. Josette lunges at her, and Kitty falls.

Barnabas who has been attracted by Kitty's screams, faces Josette.

Josette says that Olajuwon permitted her to act, because Kitty would have destroyed the family, and Olajuwon was them punished, and if they are destroyed, he cannot torment them. She says that Kitty could have ruined the famiy, and that Jamison and Nora would have died, thus leaving no family in the twentieth century.

Petofi continues his incantations


	139. Count Petofi XXIII

Quentin falls asleep and dreams of floating in air, and being drawn to a light, he follows it, feeling that he is a moth and is approaching a flame.

He wakes up and finds Aristide looking at him between expectant and skeptical.

"Did it work?" Aristide asks him. Confused, he ask what he is doing in Collinwood.

"Yyou are not in Collinwood" Aristide mocks him, sure now that the transfer has taken effect. "And you are no longer Quentin Collins."

He brings a mirror and Quentin sees himself with the face of Petofi.

"He took your body, and left you his." Aristide mocks him again.

At Collinwood, Petofi revels in his strong, youthful body He admires himself in a mirror. "Yes!" he says. "This body will serve me well."

He is interrupted by Magda who comes to discuss her nephews with him, that while the curse might have been erased for him, there is no guarantee that his children will be free of it.

"How tiresome you are, Magda" Petofi says, and puts his hand on her throat "You failed at everything, Magda. You lost everything. Your sister, your husband, you cannot help your nephews... You are a failure."

Magda backs away, sadness eating at her. She walks away, goes straight to Widow's Hill and jumps.


	140. Count Petofi XXIV

Angelique meets with Barnabas, and tells him that Magda's suicide might well have sealed the werewolf curse into place

"She may have tried to remove in on her own, she did somehting wrong, and when he realized that it could not be removed, she killed herself"

She tells Barnabas that while Chris' curse cannot be removed, it can be made manageable. She gives him a medallion, and tells him that when Chris wears it, he will retain his human mind, and thus will have control over the wolf

"He will have to go hunting regularly, and eat meat rare if not raw when the full moon approaches, but he will avoid the worst"

"And if he loses it, can he get another one?"

"I will tell you how to make more."

They are interrupted by Beth's ghost who tells them that Quentin is in danger.

Somehow Angelique manages to get Beth to explain herself, and thus they learn of the body switch, and that Petofi has commanded Aristide to kill Quentin in Petofi's body so that there is no danger of a swithc back.

Barnabas flies to where Aristide is about to cut Quentin's throat. He grabs Aristide and tears him apart, feasting on him.


	141. Count Petofi XXV

Quentin, in Petofi's body, explains to Barnabas what he learned as Aristide's captive. He has found out about his portrait, which absorbs his curse, and also made him inmortal.

Barnabas takes him to Angelique who will try to transfer the bodies to where they rightfully belong.

She has Barnabas tie up Quentin, because once he is Petofi, he is not to be allowed to escape.

Barnabas seeks Quentin's portrait, while Angelique begins her spell of restoration.

Dawn is coming and Barnabas has to go back to his coffin, while Angelique continues trying to exchange the bodies.

The spell takes effect and Petofi is disgruntled to find himself back in his old body, tied up.

"Aristide!" he calls.

"Aristide will not answer. He is dead."

"So you seek power over me! You are foolish my dear to pit yourself against me."

"I am fae. You have no power over me."

"I do not, but there is someone who owns you." He summons Nicholas who is restored to his body.

"Nicholas, you must discipline your slave."

Nicholas reclaims Angelique who protests, and they both leave.

Petofi chuckles, and recites a spell that unbinds him and allows him to walk away.


	142. Count Petofi XXVI

Petofi races back to his lodgings, to be able to reenact the ritual to reclaim Quentin's body. He is impeded in his way by the ghost of Josette who seeks to delay him, but he recognizes that she has little power over him.

When he reaches his lodgings he sees Aristide's body, and the destruction that Barnabas and Quentin have made of his ritual objects. He also sees that Quentin's portrait is gone.

Beth appears to Barnabas and Quentin, telling them that Petofi is loose again. She tells Quentin to flee, and that Barnabas should call on the spirit of Charles Delaware Tate for help.

Quentin leaves and Barnabas does as Beth suggests, and summons Charles Delaware Tate. He tells Tate that he knows he wants to be free of Petofi's power, that Petofi will never grant him freedom but that he can be made to give it up.

He has Tate draw several gypsies armed with scimitars, with chains leading from their necks to a wall. "They are chained, but if the chains are erased."

Petofi looks out the window and sees the gypsies outside, brandishing swords.

Then Barnabas comes in "We have to bargain, Petofi. We have the power to banish those gypsies or to let them have at you."


	143. Count Petofi XXVII

Petofi sees a gypsy with a scimitar who comes after him, only to stop. He turns around and sees another. Each time he turns he sees a gypsy.

Barnabas comes to him and shows him a sketch. "I can banish them, or unleash them on you." he says. He erases one to show his power, and Petofi blanches. "Do I unleash them, or do I banish them? The choice is yours."

Petofi wants to know what the price is, and Barnabas tells him. He must leave Quentin alone, and let him have the portrait. Then there is the matter of the medal that Angelique made to control the wolf inside. "But there is only one of them, and two children. And the children will have children. How can they be duplicated?" Petofi sighs and tells him how to bespell them so that when the time comes to give it away, a new one will form, and so on. There will be words of a spell that must be recited when the medal has to be given away. Barnabas copies it and decides to give it to the woman who cares for Quentin's children.

"Is that enough?'

"No. You must remove the spell on Charity Peterson, and banish Pansy Faye"

Petofi sighs, and he summons Charity/Pansy and as she comes, he touches her forehead and she is again Charity.

Charity is shocked to see Barnabas alive, and Barnabas bites her "I will have to ask you do one thing for me"

"Can I go now?' Petofi asks.

Barnabas draws some lines over the sketches. The gypsies vanish. But they are there, and if Petofi becomes a problem again, they will return.

…...

Angelique has returned to her twentieth century body, as she does not wish to deal with Nicholas nor let him suspect any change in her She looks back to see if something needs done, but she sees Petofi defeated, and that she is needed no more... "Maybe Barnabas will love me now" she says.

…...

Barnabas has Charity hide the sketches where he can retrieve them when he gets back to the present. He lies down on his coffin, willing himself to return to his body, as Charity puts the chains again on the coffin, to be opened by Willie Loomis later on.


	144. Note on the rest of 1895

Note:

Whew! That was quite a project... Count Petofi IS a lot of fun to write about (there is a reason why 1895 is everyone's favorite time period) but the action gets to sprawl around, with too many characters to keep track of. So I made a few changes.

Trask gets done in earlier – by Amanda who once she realizes she cannot get killed, uses it to become an assassin (why not? She is listed as dead, too, so no one chases after her) Kitty Hampshire is more malevolent, and since Josette is still a ghost, she cannot be reencarnated as Kitty nor anyone else. So why not let she be the one to dispose of the impostor?

Charles Delaware Tate can be a pain, so he is just an annoying ghost, and does not need to be around much, until the end.

Charity gets back to normal at the end. She is Tony Peterson's grandma (or great grandma), so she does have to get back to herself so that Tony can be born.

And Nicholas gets back too, and regains control of Angelique, who regains her 1895 mind, and then we do no meet them again until Tom Jennings bring her back with Joe Haskell's help.

History goes back to its normal channels except for the things that mattered. Laura's influence is gone, and Nora lives – which means that David has some cousins, including a Cousin Amy who might come visit.

And yes, Carl is lost in the Parallel Time room. What would have been his fate in the original timeline?

Good question.

And Magda commits suicide, since she no longer has a storyline and this brings more dramatic tension.

Well, I am exhausted. I now have to redo the Leviathan storyline, but I am taking a week or two to recharge.

See you then.


	145. What happened when they were away

In the present Barnabas is explaining Julia, who seems clueless, about his suspicions about the death of Sam Evans. He is halfway talking about Maggie's foster child, when his expression changes, his eyes go out of focus, and then stares at Julia...

"Why was I saying that?' he asks, confused.

Julia recognizes the expression. "You came back to the present, but you and I changed the past, thus Quentin never haunted Collinwood, nor David was being called by his mother."

"So we succeeded."

"Yes, but other things happened, things that the Julia and Barnabas that never went to the past witnessed, and became suspicious. Things that WE, who never witnessed them, know nothing about...You and I are the only ones who remember Collinwood being burned... Eliot Stokes did not come, as he had no reason to, and Madame Findley is very much alive."

"So that did not happen. What did happen, all that while? Is Chris Jennings still around and werewolf?"

"Yes, but he knows hwo to control it."

She fills him in. Tony Peterson was in an accident and is now in a coma. Carolyn is distraught, sure that this is punishment for her past crimes. Vicky has a new boyfriend, Frank Garner, who shares her passion for historical research, and they plan to start a historical recreation group. Sam was killed while driving, which surprised no one, since he had been drinking. Nevertheless, Roger, who was taking drawing lessons from him insists that it was no accident. Roger has been drinking more and quarreling with Elizabeth. David is much better behaved "He should, his mother no longer has a hold on him."

"And what about Maggie's foster child?" "She qualified as a foster mother, and has been taking children. First it was a baby, then they took the baby away, as it was to be adopted, then it was a three year old, who was a handful, as three year olds can be, that boy was reunited with his family, and now it is a seven year old, and that boy seemed to have you concerned."

"Yes, there was somehting that bothered me, but of course, now I do not know why it was that...I could drop in on Maggie. She told me, after all, that I could go to her for blood..."

They decide, before making plans, to consult with Willie, to see what they shared with him


	146. Leviathan 1

Barnabas surprises Maggie as she is burning her father's drawings. He asks her why she is doing it.

"I hate them. He did them when prey to the D.T.s I cannot remember him that way."

He sees that he drew a lot of snakes with human faces.

"This is what he saw, what the alcohol made him see. I should have made him stop... but I could not."

As Barnabas feeds off her he senses a deep grief, and something else that he cannot put his finger on. He asks her about her foster children

"The baby was all right... Were if not for Pop...that's when Pop lost it, really. All those years of drinking. And Michael. Michael was sweet, but troubled... There were a few accidents, none serious... well, he's gone back to his family. Megan said that there is another boy who needs me, and she'll bring him tomorrow."

Barnabas foregoes asking her to come work at the inn, as Willie is well on his way to finish fixing it. Later, when she is not grieving...

Roger is drinking, and Elizabeth remonstrates with him.

"What business is if of you, sister dear?"

"I would not want what happened to Sam Evans to happen to you."

"And you know more about how he died than you let on."

"He was drunk, he was hallucinating. He stepped in front of a car. What's more to be known?"

"And who drove the car? And who pushed Sam in front of it?"

Elizabeth is interrupted by the arrival of Frank Garner, who comes to see Vicky.

"Vicky has taken David on an outing," she says, "but come in. I need to talk to you."

She talks to Garner, who is a lawyer about what to do with Roger.. "He is my brother. I would not want anything to happen to him. He should go to rehab, but he refuses."

He says that there is a way to do it, he knows an accomodating judge, and all that is needed is for Roger to make a public scene that will bring in the cops

"And I can do that" he assures he.

"It is for his own good" Elizabeth says, and her words ring false.


	147. Leviathan 2

David complains to Vicky about his accident( having broken a leg), and blames Michael, Maggie's foster child. Vicky remonstrates him, telling him that he should have more compassion for a troubled child, and that it was his fault, too, for not paying attention to what his aunt Liz was telling him.

"Yeah, I got punished for not doing what she wants. Everyone must do as she says or we'll be punished. I got punished. Carolyn got punished. My father will be punished too."

"Carolyn? Your aunt has been nothing but good to her, since the accident."

"And what caused the accident?"

"You are being fanciful, David. Your aunt had nothing to do with it."

"Sure... well, I better do my homework, and you can go moon over Mr. Garner."

Barnabas meets Carolyn and finds her very disinheartened

"Tony does not get better, and does not get worse. I just have to wait. This is my punishment, you know. If I had done as mother wanted, if I had not been involved in that radical group...I brought him bad luck."

Barnabas tries to cheer her up, and to get information out of her, but nothing doing.

He is about to leave when David comes in. "Well, are you doing what Aunt Liz asks you to do? You better do it, or bad things will happen to you, too."

At the Blue Whale Roger is drinking and complaining about his sister.

Frank Garner approaches him and remonstrates with him,

"Try to act dignified" he say, and when Roger turns his back on him, puts a powder in the drinking glass he holds.

He taps Roger in the shoulder, and Roger comes back swinging.

They let down their drinks to have a start a fight, but the bartender tells them to cool it. They return to their drinks,

Frank making sure that he takes Roger's glass and sips it, while Roger drinks his at one gulp. "I see that there is no talking to you" he says, and leaves


	148. Leviathan 3

Roger finishes his drink, and starts ranting how everyone is lying, and no one believes him. The barternder tries to calm him, but Roger hits him, and then starts tearing up the place. He is subdued, and the police come to take him away.

Megan Todd, the social worker, comes to Maggie, bringing along James, the new foster child. James looks interested in his new surroundings, and shows marked interest in Maggie.

Maggie welcomes the child, while Megan warns James to behave himself. "We are so close now. We cannot lose it because you got careless".

Maggie says that Joe may be released soon, and will come live with her. Megan again warns James not to do anything that would irritate Joe.

"Why should I cater to that lower life form?" James asks.

In the back, among Sam's things, we see a new drawing form itself. A snake with James' face.

Sheriff Patterson comes to see Elizabeth to tell her that Roger has been arrested. She tells him that she wants him to go to rehab, but that he refuses. She tells him that if the alternative is going to jail, he will be willing. He calls on Frank Garner, and both of them browbeat Roger, and with the assistance of Patterson, get him to sign in to rehab.

"I know a place" Frank says. "I will have them come pick him up."


	149. Leviathan 4

Barnabas meets with Chris, who says that he has no problem controlling himself.

He recalls losing control when Nicholas nullifed his protection, but that ended with Nicholas' banishment. He talks about the medal he got from his father and how it allows him to retain his human mind after he transforms.

He says that he is dating Sabrina, the woman he attacked when Nicholas made him lose control. "I was worried that I had transmitted my curse to her, but it seems that when you sucked her blood you sucked out the poison too."

One thing led to the other, and they found themselves attracted to each other. He should tell her about him, though.

Maggie finds the drawing of the snake with James' face and furious, she tears it up, and burns it. Away, a new drawing starts forming itself.

The rehab people come pick up Roger. Willie sees them get out of the car and is surprised to see Jeff Clark there.

Carolyn sits at Tony's bedside, wondering if will ever come back to himself. She is joined by Vicky who tried to comfort her, but her conversation veers towards the historical recreation outfit that she and Frank are putting together, and how wonderful Frank is

"I guess you forgot all about Burke Devlin" Carolyn says, a bit irritated.

"It could not work between us"


	150. Leviathan 5

James meets Carolyn and greets her. Carolyn is so absorbed in her grief that she does not repond when James begins to touch her inappropiately.

They are interrupted by Maggie who pulls James away

"I am sorry" she says to Carolyn "he had a bad upbringing"

Maggie drags James away, who begins threatening her. "You are too young. You have to wait until you grow up." "

You have no right to deny me anything. I am your master."

"You are my charge now. You are careless and unwise. You must learn"

Elizabeth picks up the phone and goes white "How dare you come back! Haven't you done enough damage?" She slams the phone down d paces up and down. "How dare he! He has to pay"

Willie comes back to the Old House and mentions to Julia that he saw Jeff Clark, and that he was driving Roger to his rehab.

"He is now working in another health care facitily, but having worked with Lang would be a reason not to hire him. Unless..."

"Unless the place Elizabeth sent Roger to, is like Lang's, run by somebody like him."

"I think that we should pay a visit to Roger."

Megan and Maggie discuss James and his behavior.

"He is impatient." Megan says "And he knows that she is meant for him."

"But he cannot wait, and... and it attracts attention."

"I will talk to him and make him see reason."

Joe Haskell comes back, and knocks on Maggie's door. Maggie races to embrace him, while James watches him malevolently.


	151. Leviathan 6

Joe is alone reading, and we hear heavy breathing. He feels uncomfortable, and looks around. The heavy breathing intensifies, and we see a shadow forming into a snake head. The snake head rises over Joe's head.

Then we see the ghost of Woodard "He is my son. You will not harm him."

The breathing subsides, the shadow dissolves into the shadow of an unlit lamp, and Joe looks around.

"I could have sworn I heard something" he says.

Julia confront Jeff at the rehab clinic where she has gone to visit Roger.

She finds Roger calmer, and acknowledging that his drinking got out of control, and that reassures her somehow.

When she asks Jeff about his past with Lang, Jeff tells her that if she tells his current employer what he really did at the Lang clinic, he will tell the authorities what she really did there.

"I bet you did not tell them of how you and I disposed of the 'experiment'" Also he threatens to expose Barnabas. "You got a second chance. Do not deprive me of mine."

Barnabas talks to Vicky about Peterson's accident. Vicky is informative, telling him that it was a freak thing, but that the police cleared the driver of the car

"It was a mechanical failure, and the car company may end up sued for it."

Barnabas finds Vicky too engrossed in her historical recreation project to waste time discussing car accidents, even of people she knows.

Vicky says that it is a pity that Barnabas cannot go out during the day, because he could enjoy being part of a historical recreation "but you could offer one at your in, for the customers."

Paul Stoddard comes into Collinwood, certain that he will find a way to make amends to Elizabeth and Carolyn.


	152. Leviathan 7

Megan Todd arrives at the Evans cottage, summoned by the psychic cries of distress from James. She sees James cowering in a corner, facing the ghost of Woodard.

Megan dismisses the ghost, and turns to James who confesses that he was about to attack Joe "to punish Maggie"

"So you learned that it is dangerous for you to use your power when you are not fully grown. We do not forbid you things because we enjoy it, but because we know what may happen. Mind Maggie. And leave Joe alone."

Chastened, James promises to be good, and retreats to his room, drawing down all the curtains, so as t remain in complete darkness.

"I must grow into my power" he mutters to himself.

Megan confronts Joe who is beginning to ask questions. She tells him that she knows his parole offficer, and that a word from her may send him back to prison.

"You do not wish me for an enemy, Mr. Haskell"

As they sleep, we see a drawing take form, that of a snake with James' face, and one of Megan Todd showing her with a bifurcated tongue and long fangs.

Julia is putting her thoughs in order. She lists the things that are different from what they knew. She reasons that many of the changes were brought by their changing history.

Vicky was not involved in the oral history project, thus she got interested in historical recreation and meeting Frank Garner.

Tony Peterson was involved with them, and had a different timetable because of it, which meant that the changed timetable put him in the intersection when that car lost control.

David is much subdued, which is to be expected, as Laura lost his hold on him.

The changes in the family can be explained by history being changed.

But Sam Evans' death and Maggie's decision to become a foster parent cannot be laid to that change in history.

The place to investigate is the Evans cottage, she decides.

She calls Willie and tells him to befriend Joe "as an ex-con offering sympathy to another" and try to find, discreetly what is going on.

When Willie leaves, Julia sees the ghost of Woodard

"The information you seek is in Eric Lang's files" he says.


	153. Leviathan 8

Julia talks to Elliot and explains her situation.

Elliot is fascinated by her experience in changing the timestream, and wants her to fill in the details.

She tells her of Woodard's advice to look into Lang's notes, and Elliot promises to look for it.

"But you have to tell me more, because I do not know what to look for."

Elizabeth meets Paul Stoddard, who is apologetic, but says that he did not tell Jason to tell Elizabeth that he was dead.

He says that he was also deceived by Jason who told him to disappear or he would be murdered.

Elizabeth pretends to believe him, but tells him that she doe not want him in Collinwood.

As for Carolyn, he did not care for her for so long, she cannot believe he would care for her now.

Megan stops at the Blue Whale for a drink, and to overhear if anyone has suspicions.

She is relaxing, as no one seems to think that there is anything strange about Maggie and her foster children.

She is not even mentioned at all, except to commiserate on the death of Sam "but what can you expect, the way he drank"?

Suddenly she tenses up. There is something here. Something dangerous.

She turns and sees Chris Jennings who has brought Sabrina Stuart with him.

"Loup Garou" she says.


	154. Leviathan 9

Joe unburdens himself to Willie about how hard life has become, between the way the townspeople react to him as an ex-con, and Maggie being absorbed with the "brat"

He mentions that he keeps finding Sam's drawings still.

"Yeah, a lot of snakes. Snakes with human faces. Even one that looks a bit like the brat. And Megan Todd, that high and mighty social worker? Well, Sam did not like her either. There was a drawing of her with vertical slits in her eyes, and a long bifurcated tongue."

Liz talks to Frank about Paul Stoddard

"He has the gall to come back, and pretend innocence. I spent years locked up for his murder... and I never killed him!.. I could kill him now. I already pay the penalty for it."

Frank smiles "It can be arranged. You will owe me for this, though."

"Anything! I will give you anything!"

David sneaks up into Frank's room at the inn. He wants Frank gone, so that Vicky will care for him again. He finds a strange box with a snake carving. He opens it, and finds a book inside. He decides to take it.

Megan Todd and Frank Garner meet. Frank says that Liz just gave them Carolyn, in exchange for Paul Stoddard's murder.

Megan smiles. "Can be done."

"Make it hard and painful, so that she will be well pleased."

"I will unleash James on him. He wants to use his power and is chafing at the bit."

Megan tells him that he sensed a "loup garou". Tells him that those are dangerous, because their animal insticts protect them against the mental control that she can exert.

"How about the vampire?" Frank asks.

"My poison is strong enough for him if he interferes."

Frank says that he will handle the "loup garou"


	155. Note on the Leviathan episode

Note:

The Leviathan sequence is a bit harder to write because I have to untangle the mess the original story was, keeping up the good bits and the plot points, and getting rid of all that made it the least favorite story for most fans.

Its beginnings are a recipe for failure. Basically it starts before the real beginning. There is no action until Barnabas shows up, and then it all goes soooo slow, so ominous, but without real payback for weeks. And then Barnabas is so out of character. Somebody who spends his time obsessing about Josette, completely forgets her and starts on a world domination plot, that he NEVER cared about before. His job could have been done a lot better by Nicholas, or someone like him.

Then people just fall under the spell of the Leviathan, for no reason at all. There is no temptation, no Morden coming to them with the question "what do you want?" before getting them to agree.

Then,the only reason Phillip and Megan Todd were created were because both Joe Haskell and Vicky Winters were not there. With Maggie promoted to governess and Joe out in Wyncliffe, they could not be the foster parents of the Leviathan child (making the child to be a series of foster children does not require much explanations as to why they come and go. They got adopted, or returned to their families, or transferred)

Also, let us not forget that Barnabas and Julia changed history. Therefore Quentin never haunted Collinwood. Stokes did not come to Collinsport to help, Madam Findley is very much alive. And no one remembers that sequence of events, except Barnabas and Julia, because they went into the past. On the other hand, they both have no idea what was the sequence of events in the changed timeline, and have to find their way around (I stole the idea from "Eureka") which make their investigations hampered because nothing is familiar to them.

Basically this I the situation when we watch soap operas and we stop for a couple of months. When we watch it again, we have to unravel what went on before, and why things are so different now.

So now, Liz is the point person of the Leviathans, making life easier for them in Collinsport, thanks to her power and influence. She is seduced by the promise of letting her reassert her authority in the family, and later revenge on Paul Stoddard.

And I keep Megan Todd, but she is dangerous from the start (Phillip I thought I could do without)

So, I have to figure out how to keep the actions coming at the right times.

I will post next installment when I have it clearer.


	156. Leviathan 10

Julia talks to Stokes on the phone, telling him about pictures of snake with human faces. She says that she has not seen them, but that she expects to get them later.

Stokes seems concerned as he hangs up, and checks his records.

Frank determines that the werewolf is Chris Jennings, given his penchant for disappearing once a month, as the locals tell him. He wonders whether to get a silver bullet and wait for the next transformation, or to simply poison him in human form.. He needs to find out where he lives.

Joe is about to leave with Sam's drawings when he is stopped by Maggie.

"I will not allow you to drag my father through the mud!" she yells a him.

He tries to reason with her, telling her that he is concerned as to how she is changed, and that maybe taking care of the foster child has been too much for her.

She is unmoved. "You hate James, don't you?"

"I love you, Maggie."

"I will not let you hurt James, ever!"

As he turns away to leave, she hits him over the head.

Stokes looks up from his book, visibly scared. "It could be this... and if it is, we are all in danger."

He calls in Burke Devlin, and tells him that he must go back to Collinsport, that an ancient evil might be resurfacing there.

Joe wakes up, and find himself tied to a chair.

"Maggie!" he calls.

"Hush, it will be all right now. She will come, and you will understand."

Megan Todd comes and sees the bound Joe.

"He must become one of us." Maggie pleads. "As I did."

Megan opens her mouth and we see a long bifurcated tongue reach out and touch Joe who flinches. She opens her mouth wider, and we see long snake fangs flash. She bites and injects her venom into him.

"He will be sick for a couple of days." she tells Maggie" as you did. But then he will be fine. He too will protect James"

Maggie tends to Joe, while Megan goes to James' room.

"There is someone you can destroy." she says. "You can kill Paul Stoddard"


	157. Leviathan 11

Paul Stoddard is drinking late at the Blue Whale, wondering if coming to Collinsport was a mistake. He cannot soften Liz, in fact, the look in her eyes told him that she was a dangerous enemy "fortunately she does not know how to hire a hit man" he muses.

Yes, there is Carolyn, the daughter he abandoned. Does he really feel paternal about her? Is he getting sentimental now?

Why would he want to get mixed up with that family again?

He hears a deep breathing nearby, and wonders if it is the air conditioner malfunctioning.

Finally he pays, and goes out to walk to his room.

As he walks out, he hears the breathing, and a sibilant sound.

He keeps walking and the sibilant sound gets stronger.

He turns around and sees nothing, but begins to hear a whisper "You will pay now for what you did to Elizabeth"

He runs, but as he turns, he sees a giant snake coming down on him. A snake with a human face...

…...

In Collinwood, Elizabeth picks up the phone "Is it done?" she asks. And then "Did he suffer? Good"

Then she hangs up, muttering. "Since I was already imprisoned for it, I might as well commit the crime."


	158. Leviathan 12

Frank follows Chris and shoots him with a poisoned dart. Chris swipes at what he thinks is an insect bite and keeps going. Frank smiles. In a couple of days, Chris will be dead, he thinks.

Barnabas is shocked by Liz's unconcern about the fate of Paul Stoddard. As she sees it, he got what he deserved. She cannot help gloating.

Carolyn barely reacts, she seems in shock.

He talks to Vicky, after feeding, who tells him that it is to be expected. "Do you realize what Paul and Jason put Liz through?"

The sheriff comes to see him. "I know that you do not want it know what you used to do, but still, I think that your expertise might be valuable."

Barnabas barely remembers in time the cover that Burke gave him, that he used to work in British Intelligence.

He promises to look into it, and Patterson lets him look at the autopsy report. "Every bone in the body broken. Covere in a slimy substance, the skin eaten by acid."

"I cannot recall what could do this. But I will look into it."

Willie meets Joe, and asks about the drawings. Joe says that there are no drawings. And anyway, Sam was suffering from the D.T.s

"I can see why Maggie does not want to remember it."

Willie insists, and Joe pushes him away. Willie reacts, and Joe hits him.

When Willie hits back, Joe pulls a knife.

"Stay out of our business, if you know what is good for you!"

Burke Devlin arrives in Collinsport, and makes a beeline for the Old House.


	159. Leviathan 13

Vicky finds the book hidden in David's room. When she touches it, she gets a flashback of her previous life as Ellie, and the "breathing box". She sees the same design on the cover of the book.

She races downstairs and is stopped by Liz and Frank.

"Why are you so agitated?" Liz asks.

"The book, it is evil. I have to give it to Barnabas, let him know."

"We cannot let you do that" Frank says, reasonably.

Vicky tries to run but Liz holds her.

She struggles until Frank knocks her uncounscious. "i will have to ask Megan to handle her"

Burke comes over to Barnabas' who is out of it, being daytime, and gives the information to Julia. The snake people are called the Leviathans. They come from a different dimension and seek to take over the Earth, They plan to either destroy humans or to mate with them creating hybrids.

"They cannot stand here very long, so they have agents. They seek human females to impregnate, so they can have hybrids that can live here. When enough of those hybrids are created, they will change the atmosphere, to make it hospitable to them, and deadly to us."

"Do the human agents know what they are in for?"

"They think that they will be changed, and mabye some of them will."

Megan sees the bound and uncounscious Vicky in the room of the abandoned wing. "I cannot handle her. She is still uncounscious. My venom only works fighting against a conscious mind. I will be back later today to see if she is awake. Keep her secure in the meantime."

Burke tells her that Megan is not a hybrid, but the result of a Lang experiment

"I think that the Leviathans must have give him enough info to get him to try to blend human and snake DNA. Only it was no ordinary snake. Who Megan was before Lang got hold of it, it does not say. Lang did not care for the past of his subjects, only the results. Megan proved too powerful, and she escaped Wyncliffe, and has been doing the bidding of the Leviathan people ever since."

Vicky wakes up and finds herself tied up. He tries to call for help, which brings Liz to her side.

"Mrs. Stoddard, please."

"Be silent, or we'll gag you." Liz answers.

"Why are you doing this? It is evil"

"It has to be done. When Mrs. Todd gets here you will understand."


	160. Leviathan 14

Megan talks with Maggie and Joe. It is about time for James to assume his adult persona. He has accumulated enough power; he only needs the proper ritual, and they need to conduct it.

"It will be painful for you" she says, "but it will be worth it"

"Will there be need for sacrifice?" Joe asks

"Paul Stoddard was the sacrifice. No more is needed."

Burke talks with Patterson, saying that Barnabas called him, as what happened to Paul Stoddard is something he knows about. He asks if there are any old constructions, or relics. "I am looking for what could be called an altar."

"Like the one that Laura used?"

"One like that, but not that one."

Chris is escorting Sabrina to her home, when he doubles up in pain.

"What is it?" Sabrina asks

"I feel like I am on fire."

Vicky keeps struggling against her bonds. She sees the sun go down, and hopes that Barnabas can sense that she is in trouble and come rescue her. A few more minutes... just a few more minutes...

She sees the door opening. Frank and Megan come in.


	161. Leviathan 15

As Frank and Megan come in Barnabas crashes through the window at takes Vicky in his arm, breaking her ropes.

Megan attacks Barnabas, who bares his fangs. He attempts to bite her, but she spits venom in his eyes, and then bares HER viper fangs, and injects him with venom. Barnabas reels from it, and falls to the ground.

Vicky kneels by him, and notices a glass shard. She grabs it quickly as Frank catches her, twisting her arms behind her.

Megan gets up saying that she has run out of venom and will come back later when her venom sac has refilled. In the meantime, Frank is to tie up Vicky again, and not worry about Barnabas

"He will be one of us, now"

She leaves as she has to set up the altar for James' last transformation.

As she leaves Vicky kicks Frank in the shins, making him release her. He grabs her by one arm and she pivots, stabbing him in the neck with the glass shard.

Frank collapses and Vicky goes to Barnabas.

"I have her in my mind." Barnabas says "I do not know for how long I can hold on against her." Vicky helps him up, and tells him that they have to go to the Old House, that he might find help there.

As they come down, they are stopped by Liz, who points a gun at them and tells them that they are goig nowhere.

As she is making this speech, David comes from behind her and trips her. Between David and Vicky they take her gun away,

Vicky ties her up, then Vicky and David take Barnabas to the Old House.


	162. Leviathan 16

Vicky and David bring Barnabas to the Old House, and Burke decides to chain him in the coffin before his mind is taken over by Megan.

Barnabas protests but he is weak, and they use a cross on him to get him into the coffin. Barnabas screams with horror as he hears the chains close over him.

"Not again, not again, please."

Vicky talks with Burke, and gives him information about sites that could be the cairn he is looking for.

As Chis lies on the ground, whimpering, Beth Chavez appears to him.

"You must transform" she tells him. "that will clear the poison out of your system."

Chris does so, to Sabrina's horror. Sabrina recognizes him as the creature that almost killed her, and runs away screaming.

Megan leads Joe, Maggie, and James into the cairn.

"The final transformation must take place here."

She begins burning herbs on a brazier, and chanting invocations.

Burke decides that he is going to look into the cairn that Vicky showed him. Vicky wants to come along, but he says that it will be dangerous and that she will get in the way.


	163. Leviathan 17

Megan, Maggie and Joe surround James who is wavering between shapes. He is seen to grow, and to form a giant snake head.

"It is coming. He will soon be ready"

Burke approaches the cairn, searching for the underground entrance.

"Someone's coming" Megan says, and sends Joe to check what is going on.

Barnabas is moaning, locked in his coffin.

"We cannot do this to him" Willie protests "This is what he fears most"

"We have no choice" Julia reminds him.

There is a knock at the door, and when Vicky opens she sees Chris, still covered in fur. She screams, until Julia reassures her.

Chris regains human form and tells what happened to him.

"I was poisoned, and our guardian angel told me to shift shape to clear the poison of my body."

He tells that Sabrina saw him, and that she ran away. Julia sighs. It will soon be time to be giving explanations.

Joe comes up to the entrance and sees Burke. He approaches him and when Burke is close enough he stabs him.


	164. Leviathan 18

Joe stabs Burke, but his arm is deflected and he only wounds Burke. Woodard appears to Joe.

"No, son, don't do this."

Joe runs away and Woodard tells Burke. "He is my son. Please protect him. He has no control over it now, but he can be saved."

Burke ties a makeshift bandage over his wound and limps back to the Old House.

There he finds Chris, telling his tale of woe. He brightens up. "You are what we need. And now that we know where they are, we can plan an attack."

They hold a war council there, making a list of what they need and how best to attack.

"Chris will handle the snake woman. Between me, Willie, Julia, and Vicky, we can subdue Maggie and Joe. That leaves the Big One. Explosives might be needed."

David volunteers to make and bring the explosives. "I know how to do it. I learned from Carolyn and Buzz."

In the cairn James is transforming into a giant snake. It slithers to rest on the altar. "I am ready for my bride" he says.

"You must assume human form for the mating ritual" Megan says, and commands Maggie and Joe to bring Carolyn to them.


	165. Leviathan19

Maggie and Joe reach Collinwood, and are met with Liz, who has just released herself from her bonds, and the news that Frank is dead – killed by Vicky.

"There is no time now. We need Carolyn."

"Carolyn?"

"She is the Bride. You knew it. That's why we gave you the powders to make her pliable." Maggie says, calmly.

"What do you want to do with her? What do you mean, the bride?"

"The Bride of the one you once called James or Michael. He is full grown."

"No!" Elizabeth finally realizes what she has agreed to. "I cannot let you do this!"

"You gave her to us.. It was your price for having revenge on Stoddard. He did suffer, as you asked. Now, payment is due" Joe says, coldly.

Liz protests, but Joe subdues her, while Maggie runs upstairs and brings Carolyn, who is in a daze. Now it is evident that she is drugged, that has been drugged the whole time.

Liz struggles, and Joe backhands her. He pulls his knife on her. "Now, you will give us no trouble." he says.

"Do not cut her," Maggie says, as she guides Carolyn downstairs. Just tie her up again"

Liz sobs as she sees Carolyn being taken away.


	166. Leviathan 20

Maggie and Joe lead Carolyn through the woods. Carolyn is in a trance. We realize that she is drugged, that her mother has kept drugging her all this time. In the meantine, Liz is left tied up, begging to have her daughter back, saying that she was sorry, that she did not mean for this to happen.

Barnabas is locked in his coffin, raging and weeping, begging to be let out, while Olajuwon laughs at him. He swears allegiance to Megan's god, that he wants to serve Him, but is now chained.

Sabrina had reached the Sheriff's office and is weeping, telling Sheriff Patterson what she saw Chris do.

Burke, Vicky, Willie, Julia, David, and Chris circle the cairn. David carries the explosives, which he proceeds to place at the side of the cairn. Burke carries an elephant gun, which he has loaded with an explosive that David has prepared.

At Collinwood, we see Quentin approach, and knock at the door.


	167. Leviathan 21

Quentin finds Elizabeth and releases her. Sobbing, Elizabeth tells him that they have to save Carolyn. Quentin decides that he need Barnabas' help for that, and goes to the Old House.

Patterson is also going to the Old House, because he has a few questions for Barnabas.

David starts the explosives around the cairn, making a hole in the wall.

Megan turns to see them, and hisses at them, while ordering Maggie and Joe to help her stop the intruders.

Chris ruses to Megan, and grabs her. Megan struggles, but knows that she has no power over werewolves,. She spits venom at him, and tries to wriggle out of his paws, but he holds firm and tears at her throat.

Maggie and Joe grapple with Willie, Vicky and Julia, while Burke stands back, aiming his elephant gun at the giant snake on the altar. The giant snake rears up, hissing, and begins showing a human face

"You cannot stop me, puny human, with your toy"

Burke fires.

At the Old House, Quentin breaks the chains of Barnabas' coffin, hoping to gain an ally.

Barnabas rises, and hears Elizabeth plead for help in saving Carolyn.

"You gave her to us. You now broke your promise. You must die!"

Quentin sees the mistake that he has made, and puts Elizabeth behind him.

"Barnabas, what has happened to you?"

Barnabas tears up Quentin.


	168. Leviathan 22

Chris has killed Megan, while Julia, Vicky, and Willie have trouble holding Maggie and Joe. Burke has fired at the snake, but the shot only glanced him. He steadies his gun, but the wound that Joe gave him makes it difficult for him. The snake comes down on him.

David rushes to him, and helps him steady the gun. Burke fires.

The snake's head explodes and catches fire.

When the snake dies, both Maggie and Joe collapse.

At the Old House, Barnabas has caught Elizabeth and is about to kill her, when he too collapses.

Moments later Patterson comes in, and sees the dismembered corpse of Quentin, an unconscious Barnabas with blood splattered all over him, and a hysterical Elizabeth.

Before he can start making sense of what he sees, the body of Quentin starts putting itself together again.

When Quentin has finally recovered, the rest of them arrive, carrying the unconscious Joe and Maggie.


	169. Note at the end of the Leviathans

Note at the end of the Leviathans:

So the storyline ends at is should, not with a whimper, but with a bang – with several bangs.

After all my teachers were Mr. Howard, Mr. Fine, and Mr. Howard who taught me that all plot points must end in a big catastrophe, the bigger the better.

Quentin does not come until the end – same as Angelique, and Nicholas. In the original they had little to do, and the plotline meandered with a lot of incident, but little plot progession, and at the end, it all gets solved because Jeb wants to be human...

Not very good plotting.

We will have Quentin and Angelique, and Sky Rumson and Nicholas. But without the encumbrance of the Leviathan plot. We have to give Barnabas time to recover before we send him to Parallel Time.

(By the way, in Parallel Time the American Revolution failed. America is still under the British Crown )

P.S. :Yes, they rescued Carolyn, too. I forgot to type her name among those who get to the Old House...


	170. Leviathan aftermath

Patterson starts demanding explanations, as Burke says that the problem is solved and that there is no more danger.

Patterson wants to know how Quentin who was dead a few minutes ago is now getting up, and what about that furry guy, and what happened to Maggie and Joe, and why is Carolyn so stunned, and why is Barnabas all covered with blood.

Seeing that explaining will take too much time, Julia hits Patterson on the head with a heavy object and he collapses.

" You can explain things to him when he wakes up"

Vicky goes back to Collinwood with Burke to retrieve the box that she found. She may have to pass by Frank's body but she swallows and accepts it.

Willie puts Barnabas again in the coffin, and locks it again, and helps Julia take Maggie and Joe to beds upstairs

"And chain them to the beds, in case they recover and try to get up and revive that monster"

They make Patterson lie down, and watch Chris revert to human form. They tell Elizabeth to remain and not bring Carolyn back to Collinwood.

"And maybe she should NOT go with you."

Chris distraught about the fact that he just killed someone, even if it was not properly human, then wonders if Sabrina will still accept him.

When Burke and Vicky return, they discuss the events. The box was used to carry the embryo – the egg – that grew up in human form first as a baby, and then as two children, cared for Maggie and Joe

"I introduced Maggie to Megan." Elizabeth confesses "I was told that this way things would go back as they were in Collinwood"

"And who promised you that?"

"Frank Garner"

"And I killed him" Vicky says.

Sam Evans was too drunk for Megan's influence to have effect, and he had seen the transfromations for the child into snakes, so he had an accident.

"And Peterson's accident?"

"I think they caused it. His being in a coma made Carolyn despondent, and thus docile again, as I wanted her to."

"And you drugged her, too."

"Yes." Elizabeth admits.

"And Paul Stoddard?"

"It was IT, the monster. And then they told me that the price for it was to give Carolyn to be the bride of.. of that thing."

"Well, I know what Megan's venom was" Julia says "I think that I can counteract it so that Maggie, Joe and Barnabas go back to normal. It will take some time, but I can do it."

Then it is time for Quentin to tell his story. Thanks to Tate's portrait he cannot change, age, nor die. That's how he survived being torn apart. He is now trying to track the woman called Amanda Harris, because she too is protected by her own portrait.

"We are two of a kind. Maybe we belong together. Maybe we don't. But I want to find out." Vicky and Burke promise to help him look.

Patterson begins to moan, and they decide that it is time to give explanations, and try to blame it all on Megan, Frank, and the monster. And hope he overlooks Quentin's, Chris', and Barnabas' peculiarities.


	171. Leviathans 23

They half convince, half drag Patterson to the cairn, where they show him Megan's corpse, showing her snake tongue and fangs, plus the dead giant snake.

This makes Patterson willing to believe their story about the snake creatures takeovers, but still does not explain EVERYTHING he sees.

Burke sighs. It will be a LOOOONG explanation. "Just remember we just saved the whole of humanity" he says.

They pile the snake's body, Megan's body, and the box in the middle of the cairn, and David does the honors with an incendiary bomb, which consumes the three.

Then they blow up what's left of the cairn and Burke seals it with an incantation.

"They won't be able to come through here ever again."

Vicky confesses about killing Frank Garner

"It was self-defense. He was going to give me to that... woman" she says

. "Yeah, can see that. But what about that furry guy, and the one that was torn to pieces and came back?"

"Well, I am as baffled as

you as that. I will have to ask questions"

"And Barnabas Collins?" "Barnabas had been bitten by the snake woman and was under the influence of her venom. Same as Maggie and Joe." "Yeah, yeah... And he is from British Intelligence... sonny, you have to come up with a better story about him."

Barnabas whimpers in his coffin. "Please, let me out... let me out" Olajuwon laughs at him.

In the hospital, Tony Peterson wakes up.


	172. Search for Amanda I

Vicky ask Quentin why he thinks that she can help him track down Amanda, considering that she has no reason to visit Collinsport, and that she now probably uses a new name.

He says that he saw a photo of her in the background of a robbery that took place not far from Collinsport, and that she can track down whatever information she can get of that old robbery. Also there in the background of the photo you can see a younger Roger Collins, and he seems to be close to her. Maybe it was just proximity. But maybe...

Patterson is getting more and more riled out as the information keeps coming out of Burke. Chris has transformed back and admits that he is a werewolf – which puts Patterson in more of a bad mood. As for Barnabas... well, Willie does not stand well to interrogation and admits that Barnabas is a vampire...

"And this is happening right under my nose! I cannot allow it to continue!" He stands, up pulling up his gun.

Julia, who sees what is coming, hits him over the head again.

"What are we going to do with him?" Burke asks, exasperated.

Chris decides to go see Sabrina, and try to explain things to her. Julia goes back to preparing the serum to neutralize Megan's venom.


	173. Search for Amanda

As Patterson lies unconscious he has a vision.

Woodard appears to him and tells him two things, that he cares about his son, Joe Haskell, and that Joe's hope lies with Burke, Julia, Barnabas, and the others.

Also "I do not like to see good friends of mine at odds".

He lets Patterson know all that has transpired and impresses him that while it might not look like it, Barnabas is a guardian.

"For things do happen in Collinsport, things that human law enforcement cannot handle. So he is here, and he brings helpers when he needs to."

When Patterson wakes up he is more amenable to Burke's explanations and is willing to overlook a few things.

He will put Frank Garner's death as self-defense (which it was) and blame Paul Stoddards' killing on the giant snake (and Garner and Megan will be both made responsible for it).

"Just don't try to bamboozle me again, sonny." he tells Burke.

Vicky gets all the data she needs to start looking at the records for the robbery, and hope that she can talk to Roger.

Carolyn is slowy coming out of her trance. She is told that Tony Peterson is awake, but still weak. She goes to see him.


	174. Search for Amanda III

Carolyn confronts her mother, accusing her bitterly of having sold her to an unholy monster. Elizabeth does not deny it, but tries to excuse herself.

Carolyn leaves and then Elizabeth has to confront Vicky who tells her that she is leaving her employ, and that she should send David to a school away from Collinsport "so that he can have a normal life"

Elizabeth tries to cajole her, telling her that it was all Frank and Megan's fault, that they had robbed her of will.

"For some reason I do not believe it."

Julia has given the second dose to Maggie and watches her reaction as she makes her remember the events. Maggie starts crying when she realizes that Megan had killed Pop, because he knew too much.

She is distraught, and while it is upsetting to watch her, it is a good sign that she has recovered.

She is to be kept for observation, but Julia is confident that Joe will react the same way. Then it will be Barnabas' turn.

Carolyn returns to his mothere, and announces that she will marry Tony Peterson as soon as he leaves the hospital. When Elizabeth tries to make her abandon the plans, Carolyn plays back her confession that she tapped.

"This is a copy. I have the original is a safe place. So, Mother, it is time for you to do as you are told, or face charges for the murder of your husband."


	175. Search for Amanda IV

Maggie is recovered and can go home.

Joe is also responding to treatment. He remembers being tied to a chair, and Megan coming down with her snake fangs and tongue. Julia thinks that by the next day his blood will be clean, and he too can go home.

Barnabas keeps moaning and begging to be released. Willie protests that he is suffering, and that they cannot keep him locked up like this.

"We cannot release him until it is safe"

"His mind will be gone by then, and he WILL be dangerous."

"Talk to him, try to calm him down. Tell him it will be a couple more days."

Vicky goes to see Roger, who seems improved.

She tells him that he was right, and Sam Evans was killed. He gets to hear the whole story, and is not shocked about Liz's involvement.

"She could not stand losing power. Father put her in charge as soon as he saw me as a disappointment... Same as was done to his own father... He was raised under the authority of both his grandmother and his aunt, and for him it was natural to put a woman in charge when the man was not good enough in his eyes. So, Elizabeth was put in control, and she loved that... "

Vicky gets the conversation back to the robbery back in the day, and shows the picture of Amanda.

"That's Olivia... Olivia Corey... she came with a man who said he was his brother, and charmed father..."

"Did she charm you?"

"A bit, but I became suspicious. I thought that the man was not her brother."

"They were running a con?"

"Might be. They disappeared after the theft... I guess they used my father as a way to get introductions to the people they really wanted to meet.."

"What was the man's name?"

"I cannot recall now. But it might come back later to me..."


	176. Search for Amanda 5

Woodard appears to Joe Haskell, and calls him "son" Joe is dismissive of him.. Why couldn't he have acknowledged him when he was alive?

Woodard confesses that Joe's mother was a patient of his, and if it became known, they would have stripped him of his license for it was a serious breach of ethics

"I did not mean for it to happen. I was in love... and I did not think... I was so young."

"Well, my father is Haskell, not you."

Woodard pleads with him not to go back to his old ways.

"No matter how angry you are with me, smuggling drugs is not the answer"

"Don't worry. I learned my lesson. Though even when I get into the straight and narrow, I get in trouble..."

Barnabas begs to be let out of his coffin, whimpering. Willie grits his teeth, and tries to ignore him, but the blood link he has with Barnabas makes his pain impossible to ignore

"It ain't right" he says "it ain't right"

Carolyn comes back to Collinwood, with Tony.

"Have you reconsidered?" Elizabeth ask, hopeful.

"No, I have come to see what I want to takea with me."

"Where are you going?"

"Tony and I got married an hour ago at the justice of the peace."

Elizabeth flinches. "I had dreamed of a big wedding here, in Collinwood, a big party.."

"And then you tried to wed me to a giant snake. No, mother, it is too late to get sentimental now."

Tony stares at her. "The evidence against you is secure. So I advice you not to interfere with us. If you behave, we may even let you see your grandchildren."

Vicky tries to track the name Olivia Corey in the newpapers in the library. She sees the name on a playbill. She notes the names of the othe actors. Maybe Roger will recognize one name. And she can try to reach the surviving casts members or their families.


	177. Search for Amanda 6

Willie cannot bear the whimpering from Barnabas anymore and he releases him.

Barnabas stands up, steadily, and Willie sees, with fear the look of madness in his eyes.

"You are all right," he says, trying to calm him.

Barnabas moves ominously towards him, his eyes shining, and ready to tear up this... creature in front of him.

A ghostly hand touches him over the heart, sending cold through his body, and again, we hear Sarah's song.

"I vouched for you to Patterson" Woodard says, calmly "Don't make a liar of me."

Between the cold in his chest, and the song penetrating his mind, Barnabas collapses on a chair.

Julia and Burke race to see what happened. They are shocked to see Barnabas up and about.

Woodard chides Julia "You may be a great biochemist, but you know nothing about making a patient comfortable. Were you going to keep him like that until you fried his brain?"

"He is dangerous".

"Pump him full of garlic juice them. It will weaken him, and make him amenable. But he will be able to get up and move about a bit. Do not torture him, even if it is "for his own good"".

Elizabeth walks around Collinwood, feeling how empty it is. Only she is left now, all alone...Maybe Roger will come back, but Carolyn and David will be gone...

"This place needs children" she says to herself.

Vicky has put together some playbills with Olivia Corey's name in it, and brings them to Roger, to see f he recognizes any other name.

Roger points to a name "Charles Rumson"


	178. Search for Amanda 7

Barnabas recovers slowly, and Julia, on top of dosing him with liquid garlic, has him chained by the ankle – just to be safe.

He talks to Maggie and Joe,but is warned not to take their blood, as theirs is still contaminated.

Maggie is willing to talk about working the inn once Willie has finished fixing it. "And with luck, Joe will not be tempted to run drugs again."

Barnabas tells Joe that Woodard ran inteference for him with the sheriff, warning him of possible ambushes.

"And this is why the Sheriff did not trust him, and when he wanted somehting done about Eric Lang, Patterson did not listen. So he went basically alone, with me as bait, and... and you know how it ended."

In the meantime, Vicky has tracked down the son of the Rumsen connected with Olivia Corey.

She calls on him, posing as a reporter. He is a successful businessman, and proud of his accomplishments. He welcomes Vicky to his home, and introduces her to his wife.

It is Angelique'


	179. Search for Amanda 8

Vicky remembers having seen her at the Old House, but Angelique does not recognize her. Vicky gets no reaction when she mentions Collisnport, nor the Collins family.

She is puzzled by this, but remembers that he is to get information about Amanda Harris, AKA Olivia Corey.

Rumsen says that this woman once was close to his father, but that she drifted away.

"I do not know where she might be now" Vicky mentions that she may have had a business in common with Rumsen's father.

"That might be. Not all of my father's business were wise. I think that I do better than that.

Vicky senses that Rumsen is not telling her anything he knows, but she has no way to get him to talk... Maybe when Barnabas gets better he can interrogate Rumsen..

In the meantime Elizabeth writes to her aunt Nora, asking if Amy's, Nora's grandchild can come stay at Collinwood.

Since Amy's parents died in a plane accident, Nora has been taking care of Amy, but she is old, and would like to have Elizabeth assume responsibily.

Vicky comes back to the Old House and tells of her frustration to Burke.

"So the trail of Amanda has grown cold?" Burke asks

"All I found out is the name she once went by: Olivia Corey"

Burke is thundestruck. "Olivia Corey is one of our operatives"


	180. Search for Amanda 9

Vicky is surprised to hear that Amanda is an operative in the same organization than Burke and Stokes, but then she realizes it makes sense.

She plans to tell Quentin, but Burke will want to see if Quentin can be recruited too.

"And maybe you should come work for us, since you want to leave Mrs. Stoddard's employ"

"David still needs me."

"I will talk to

Carolyn about sending him to school so that he can grown in an normal environment. Now that Laura has been severed from him, he should have no problems" "Except his knowledge of explosives"

"Well, you cannot have everything"

Nora has a vivid dream about Collinwood, from when she was a child, and is disturbed. She sees a cave and hears the words "I am waiting for you"

She is upset when she wakes up, and wonders if she is doing the right thing sending Amy there. She tries to remember, and when she tries to place it, she recalls her mother, and her death...

"Yeah, it is now an anniversary of her death" she says to herself. "so I do dream of her"

She is still uneasy, but her reason tells her that she cannot care for Amy properlty at her age, and both Elizabeth and Roger know how to handle children.

Chris tries to talk to Sabrina, to explain, but she points a gun at him.

"You are not human" she shouts at him . "I'll tell the sheriff"

"He knows it."

"And he does nothing?"

"I have committed no crimes that he can arrest me for"

"You attacked me"

"Under the influence of a drug that was given to me without my knowledge"

"You could have killed me.

" Yes, but Barnabas got there in time"

"Barnabas, was he the one who rescued me?"

"Yes, and he knows it was me."

"And he protected you..."

She does not lower her gun and makes him go away, but remains pondering.


	181. Judah Zachary 1

Sabrina decides to talk to Barnabas to see if what Chris says is true. Why would he cover up a werewolf, a dangerous beast like that?

She gets in as Julia finally releases him, as he considers him cured.

"But remember, keep away from Maggie and Joe, since their blood may still be contaminated"

"I imagine that in a couple of months they will be safe again."

They are in this as Sabrina bursts in.

"Tell me that it isn't true. That you are not covering for that...that beast!"

Barnabas sees that she is close to hysterical, and since he has not fed yet, he decides to kill two birds with a stone. He feeds on her, and as he does, he manages to calm her enough so that she will listen.

"A vampire and a werewolf...in the same town." she manages to say.

"Yes. And in case you are wondering, when I rescued you, I still fed off you since I had been wounded and need to get my strength back..."

He manges to impress her that Chris does care about her, and that the one time he lost control was due to the effect of an enemy damaging him. "It is no differing than drugging him and putting him on the wheel of a car."

Amanda talks on the phone with Burke Devlin, and agrees to come see Quentin,

"After all, we are members of an exclusive club, results of magic portraits of Charles Delaware Tate"

Nora takes the train with Amy... she grumbles that she had to give up her car because of her eyes. Still, a train ride is not so bad. Amy asks her about Collinwood, and Nora tries to be cheerful, though she is filled with foreboding...

If only Amy's uncle was not in Italy, and unwilling to come back, if he had not been estranged from them for so long... Now it seems that Roger and Elizabeth will be the closest family Amy will have when her time comes...


	182. Judah Zachary II

Nora brings Amy to Collinwood.

"It was nice of you to welcome us, Elizabeth." she tells Liz. "This is my grandchild, Amy Howell. Say hello to your aunt Liz" she says.

Elizabeth shows Amy her room, and then goes back to the foyer, so that she and Nora can talk.

Nora is visibly shivering, as she looks around "it is still the same" she says. "even with the changes, it is still the same"

She enquires about Roger, and is told that he will coming back in a few days.

"As for Carolyn, she is married and moved away. She is in town, but she and her husband have a cottage."

"Yes, much better than here for a child." Nora says. She has misgivings about leaving Amy in such a ominous house, where the walls whisper to her. But what can she do?

Amy lies down in the bed, and as she begins to sleep a voice comes to her. "yes, she brought you to me. You will do nicely"

Nora sits by the fire, and as she does, she begins to remember other times, when she was a child, she thinks of her mother... and the one night when all changed.

There is a knock at the door. The servants let the newcomer in.

"I was told that we have a cousin come visit us." Barnabas says. "I come to welcome her."

Nora looks at him, and when she sees his face she screams.

"You! You killed my mother!"


	183. Judah Zachary III

Nora lies in a coma in the hospital. As she lies there she sees a man approach her.

"You did not keep faith with me" he says.

"He... he stopped me. He was stronger."

"Bring your grandaugher to me"

"No...not her."

"Bring your grandaughter to me."

...

Nora's spirit rises from her body, and moves to Collinwood. She glides into Amy's bedroom.

Amy wakes up and sees her. "Grandma..."

"Hush child. You must find the cave. There is treasure hidden there."

We see in a vision the cave that Petofi sealed. "I cannot."

"You must have help." Nora drops a piece of paper by the bed.

…...

Liz talks to Vicky about Amy.

"I will need you if I am to care for Amy."

"Amy has other relatives."

"None can be found. I am her closes relative, and when Nora passes, I will be resposible. I know that I have done horrible things, and I cannot expect you to forgive me, but that little girl needs someone."

"Maybe Carolyn and Tony would like to take her in. And it would be healthier for her."

…...

Barnabas is upset by Nora's accusation.

"They won't believe her.' Willie says "They cannot imagine you going back in time. As it is, she is old and easily confused. She mistook you from someone in her youth...which was so long ago."

"But it is true. I killed her mother. Or at least sent her away from this plane. I saved Nora from her, but then, she did not know that"

"That was Laura, wasn't it?"

"Yes. I understand that Vicky had to deal her here a couple of years ago."

"Well, the ones who will believe Nora also know why you did it, and will keep silent."

…...

Nora wakes up. She picks the piece of paper. We see the name there " Gerard Stiles"


	184. Judah Zachary IV

The paper catches fire and Amy drops it. It disappears. Amy stares at it, then goes back to bed.

In the morning there are no ashes, no trace of burns.

"I dreamed it" Amy says. "it seemed so real".

She goes down and meets Carolyn and Tony, who come to see their little cousin.

Carolyn insists that Amy come stay with her for a few days.

Liz denies it, saying that Carolyn and Tony do not have the time for her. Carolyn insists, and Tony makes veiled references to the Leviathan. Liz pales, and lets Amy go with them. "until Nora decides otherwise".

Carolyn lets out a sigh of relief as they leave Collinwood.

"Too gloomy a place for children" she says "Even staying with Barnabas might be better."

Amanda Harris comes to Collinsport, called by Burke. She is surprised that she is supposed to meet Quentin "and recruit him if you can" but she is game.

She meets the rest of them, and they catch up with each other.

She is not sure that she loves Quentin, but, as they share a past, they might yet make go of it. "I am not sure that we will be the great love. But we can be friends with benefits."

Vicky tells of tracing her through Rumsen.

"But the trail got cold. I got to meet the son, but he said little."

"Maybe he does not want to remember...you see, I ruined his father."

"Why?"

"He tried to cheat me of my share and kill me. He did not know what I am, so I waited a couple of years, laid my plans, and had my revenge. How is Sky doing?"

"Well, he's rich."

"Rich? That's a surprise. I would hope that he got rich by honest means, but knowing who taught him, I doubt it... better tell me all you know, because there are ways of getting rich that we may be concerned about."


	185. Judah Zachary V

Amy goes to sleep in the Peterson's apartment and she is undisturbed by dreams.

In what was her room in Collinwood, there are whispers, calling her. As no one answers, there is an angry wind and a broken branch crashes through the window.

Liz gets up to see what the noise is, and she is greeted by a deep mist forming whirlwinds, and a voice that whispers "bring her back" The name Gerad Stiles shows in the mirror.

...

Vicky and Burke talk with Barnabas, Vicky mentioning that she met Angelique, but that she did not seem to recognize her.

"But you met her?' Barnabas tries to recall if she did or not.

"I saw her through the window, floating in a white nightgown. She turned around, and she stared with the bluest eyes I have ever seen." "And now?" "Now when I mentioned Collisnport, it was as if I was talking about any other town. She listened to it to be polite, but it did not connect. But she was here!"

Burke interrupts. "What is Angelique, actually?"

"She is of the Fae, or Faery. I think that she may be a water nymph."

"I see.." Burke considers it. "Have you heard of Selkies?"

"The seal people?"

"Yes, you steal their skin, and they are in your power. Men used to get wives that way, or so the story goes. But the reality is that many of the Fae have a secret source of power. Take it, and they lose themselves. They do not remember being Fae. But the power is there, and whoever controls them, can use the power for themselves. I think that this is what Sky Rumsen is doing."

"What do you plan to do?"

"Find out first what he is using her for. He may be using her to get rich. But I do not think that he knows how to handle that power. The likelihood that he will cause a disaster is great. Fae power belongs to the fae, whoever tries to tap it, ends up with it blowing in its face. I hope that we can get there in time."

…...

In the morning Liz goes to what was Amy's room. There is no mist, no branch, no broken window...

"What a strange dream." she says.


	186. Judah Zachary VI

Sky Rumsen welcomes visitor to his home, Gerard Stiles. He greets Angelique who acts as the perfect hostess. Later he joins Rumsen "to talk business"

"You have done well for yourself.' Stiles says. "The lady is what you expected?"

"Yes. I am forever grateful to you."

"Grateful enough to use that power for the summoning?"

Rumsen flinches. "I know that it is dangerous."

"Rumsen, do you think that I captured a nymph so you could have a a nice playmate? You think that her power is only good for making your rich? There is a use to that power, and I intend to use it. I WILL summon Nicholas Blair and make him tell me what I want to know."

"But...but... you told me that you were in the trail of one Judah Zachary."

"I will get back to it. But now there is a block. The one that holds the secret has been removed from my influence. She will come back, but until she does, I can interrogate Blair."

"And if Blair comes back with full power?"

"I will deal with Blair. He cannot do much damage." ("not to me, he thinks...you...well, you are expendable)


	187. Judah Zachary VII

Burke and Amanda discuss how to handle Sky.

They need to know where Sky keeps the artifact that keeps Angelique in thrall, and the best way they think, is to have Sky show it to them. Make him feel threatened.

Barnabas says that he can help. That there is a will-of-the-wisp who is indebted to him, and since he never cashed that debt, it may lay a geas on it.

"What did you do for her?"

"Killed her. Rather killed the body where she was imprisoned by Nicholas Blair."

"Then we can ask her to spy on him, after we spook him.

…...

"Call her back. Call her back" the whispers come to Elizabeth.

She reluctantly wakes up and sees again the writing in the mirror. She wipes it, but it comes back. "It is a dream again. When I wake up it will be gone." she says, and goes back to sleep.

…...

Barnabas has helped summon the will-of-the-wisp and demanded its cooperation.

"When I freed you from that body, I laid a geas on you. Now we ask you to go spy on a man who we believe is keeping another fey captive"

The will-of-the-wisp reluctantly agrees.

…...

Quentin comes to see Sky, and aks his about Olivia Corey.

"And old friend of mine" he says. "she will be glad to see me."

Sky denies knowing where she is, and is a bit bemused why two different people have asked him about a woman he has not thought about for years. He gets a call from Gerard Stiles, reminding him of the date when they will try to raise Nicholas Blair.


	188. Judah Zachary VIII

Nora dreams and a voice keeps asking "what happens to Amy after you die? Who will care for her?"

When she wakes up, Nora, asks to see a lawyer.

…...

The will-of-the wisp hovers over the Rumson house, as Amanda comes calling.

"Have you been telling people about me?' she asks angrily.

"I haven't I have not thought about you in years."

'Yeah, too busy keeping your little fey slave wife."

As Sky is startled that she sees this, Amanda chuckles.

"Come on, Sky, I know a thing or two, and I can read the signs. But the question is, why are people looking for me, and why are you helping them?"

"I had nothing to do with them. I do not know why they came to me. Maybe they confused me with my father."

"Maybe. Just remember what happened to your father after he tried to double-cross me. You would not like to lose you little fey, would you?"

"I swear that I have nothing to do with those people. I do not know why they are looking for you. The man, Quentin Collins, he says he is a friend of yours."

"He would say that, of course. Well, Sky, remember to keep your mouth shut. Or you will regret it, as your father did."

After Amanda leaves, Sky opens the secret compartment of his desk, and looks at the piece of seaweed. He sighs and moves it, putting it under a loose tile in the kitchen, and sealing it with groat.

The will-of-the-wisp observes this.


	189. Judah Zachary IX

Sky picks up the phone, and Gerard Stiles reminds him that he is supposed to bring Angelique to the summons

"There is a problem.'Sky says, and tells of Amanda's visit.

"When Nicholas Blair gets here you need not worry about her, nor anyone else

The will-of-the-wisp hears the conversation as it goes through the wire.

She remembers Nicholas Blair and what he did to her. When she returns to Barnabas she tells him all of it, and says that she will help them, to get her revenge on Blair.

They need to get Angelique out of the house, because she WILL protect it against intruders, even if is she unaware that she is using her powers. The will-of-the-wisp offers to lure her away, so that Burke and Amanda can retrieve her seaweeed.

The will-of-the-wisp gives them a calling horn, a sound that all fey must obey, no matter their circumstances. They way until Sky leaves, with Angelique staying behind, and Burke blows the horn.


	190. Judah Zachary X

As Sky leaves, Angelique stays alone in the house. She hears a faint melody and tries to locate it. It sounds familiar, but what it is?

"Come sister. Come to me."

She shakes her head. She must be imagining things.

"Come sister."

The horn blows, and Angelique feels herself pulled.

She cannot explain it. But suddenly she knows she must follow.

"Come sister."

She sees a light moving ahead, and she begins to follow it. She opens the door and walks out.

As she walks out, Amanda comes in. Amanda races to the kitchen, and breaks the tile that the will-of-the-wisp indicated. She finds the seaweed.

"Angelique. I command you. Come to me now.

Angelique stops. She hears a summons. A more urgent summons.

" I command you."

She goes into the house and sees Amanda. "My mistress" she says.

"This is yours, Angelique" Amanda throws the seaweed at her. "I do not wish the power it brings."

Angelique takes the seaweed, and a change comes over her features.

"I... I remember...Sky stole this from me..."

"Yes. Angelique. And you may wish to be revenged on him."

"He wants to bring back Nicholas Blair, do you remember him?" the will-of-the-wisp tells her.

"Nicholas Blair..."

"We will have our revenge, sister."

"And I wil help, with my friends;" Amanda says.


	191. Judah Zachary XI

Sky returns and sees that Angelique has prepared a special dinner with some of his favorite foods, and welcomes him with a low cut dress.

"I feel so fortunate that I have you for a husband that I want to show you my appreciation." She pours him a champagne glass and says "I want to make it this a night you won't forget"

Sky drinks and takes a mouthful. It tastes delicious, as Angelique hovers over him.

He takes a couple more bites. "Funny aftertaste" he says.

Angelique kisses him. Sky closes his eyes.

When he opens it, he is staring at a globin who laughs at him. And he is eating dog feces.

Angelique comes through the door. "I have my seaweed back. And I called my unseelie friends."

The globin kisses him, and takes him in her arms. Sky screams and fights, but the goblin drags him away.

"She is very lusty. She finds you very attractive" Angelique says. "When she is done with you, we will talk about Nicholas Blair."


	192. Judah Zachary XII

Gerard Stiles welcomes Sky and a seemingly meek Angelique to his home. He brings them to the altar where they are supposed to summon Nicholas Blair.

"Do you understand why you are here?" He asks Angelique.

She nods, smily shyly. "Sky said that I might help. He did not explain much, but I trust him."

Stiles nods.

He looks at Sky. "Why are you so glum? It will all work out fine."

He begins the invocation, and asks Angelique to take his hand so that he can concentrate. Angelique takes it, and seemingly the power flows from her to Stiles.

A figure begins to form on the altar. Nicholas' features begin to form.

Angelique smiles, and pulls her hand, drawing the power back from Stiles.

"He is here!" She shouts. "He is all yours now!"

The Unseelie host rushes in, and captures Nicholas as he takes solid shape. They laugh at his fear.

"You will serve our Queen now"

Fire breaks out at the altar, and Stiles is knocked down by it. Angelique laughs at him. "You will pay the price for meddling with faerie" she says.

Sky whimpers and begs for mercy.

"Mercy? Whaat is that? Faery knows not the word"

The goblin comes back and drags away the struggling Sky.

Angelique laughs uncontrolably..

…...

At a distance, Amanda and Burke watch the fire. "What do you think she is doing to them?" Burke asks.

"No more than they deserve. They were dangerous, and had to be stopped."

"But still."

"You know what Nicholas Blair was like. You had to deal with him. Do you wish him back?"


	193. Judah Zachary XIII

Gerard Stiles crawls under the debris. He looks around, but sees none of the fey.. They are done with him, he thinks.

And maybe he will die from his wounds soon..

He manages to get up. He has enough power to heal himself, up to a point. But he needs more.

He needs Judah Zachary's power.

And there is only one way to get it.

Nora at one time could find him, he knows. But Nora is dying. So it is up to Nora's grandchild, Amy

Amy must go back to Collinwood..

...

Carolyn and Tony come to see Barnabas, how the restoration project is coming up. Barnabas tells them that he is thinkin of hiring Joe Haskell to provide them with fresh seafood. That and giving tourists's rides in his boat.

"Which will be better for him than running drugs" Tony interjects. "I got him a light sentence, next time he won'd be so lucky"

Barnabas ask about Amy. She is doing well, being more of a normal child.

"I take it that you do not want her around here."

"She has had a bad shock, between her parents and Nora. Who knows what she might see here, or what she may sense... maybe later when she is more settled"

"I understand, It does not help that Nora accuses me of killing her mohter... which is technically correct"

…...

In the basement where he is hidden, Gerard Stiles projects himself over Nora's hospital bed. "have you made your will, Nora?" he asks Nora nods. "And you give exclusive guardianship of Amy to Elizabeth Stoddard? Nora nods "Then you can now die"

Nora collapses in her bed.


	194. Judah Zachary XIV

As they prepare for Nora's funeral, Elizabeth calls Vicky and tells her that since David will go to school away from home, she is no longer needed.

Elizabeth tells her to get out of the house immediately "since you do not want to stay here"

Vicky protests that she has yet to find a new place, and Elizabeth shrugs. "You can always go to the motel."

Roger sees this and sighs. "At least you are getting out. Me, I will be stuck here. And since everybody knows that I am drunk that had to go to rehab..."

David comes to see Barnabas, as he will be leaving Collinsport right after the funeral, and would like to know a few things about the family that no one else told him about.

Barnabas tells him that the one important thing to know is Olajuwon, and how he is collecting from the family, generation after generation.

"Working for civil rights, supporting the NAACP and other such organizations is not just a question of having liberal principles, for this family it is a matter of survival. It is the price that you all have to pay to keep the family going through the ages."

"I thought that he took it out on you."

"Yes, but I am not the only one, just the one who got it worst. Remember that. This family has a standing debt with every African American in this country. And defaulting on the debt means death and destruction."

"Aunt Nora..."

"I undestand that she gave quite an amount of money there. Not enough to spare her children, but enough to spare Amy."

David ponders this "About my mother.."

"Her influence over you is broken."

David tells Barnabas that Elizabeth ejected Vicky, barely giving her time to pack.

In the meantime, Chris and Sabrina seem to have reached an undestanding. Sabrina wonders if there is no possibility of cure fore him.

"I have learned to live with it. And with promised cures, I learned to be wary of what the price would be. Tom believed one such promise, and it ended badly for him. I will not repeat his mistake."

Barnabas meets Vicky as she is about to check into the motel.

"You should not spend your money until you got a new job." he tells her. "I got room at the Old House."

"But, it would not be right..."

"Julia will act as chaperone, if Burke gets curious."

She agrees to go with him, and see what she can do to earn her keep


	195. Judah Zachary

The family gets together to hear Nora's will.

Apart from several bequests the bulk of her estate will go to Amy. And she names Elizabeth as sole guardian of Amy, hoping that she will grow up in Collinwood, where her own childhood was spent.

Elizabeth tells Carolyn curtly that she expects Amy to be in Collinwood by the evening. Carolyn protests, but Elizabeth has the law on her side, and she knows it.

Tony reminds Elizabeth that they know things about her that could be made public.

"I also know things that can send Carolyn in jail. And while I do not care so much for a jail sentence, I think that Carolyn would like it even less. She is in love, married, with a nice future in front of her. She does not want to lose that... Me, if I cannot get what I want, I do not care."

Carolyn acknowledges defeat and in the evening Tony drives Amy to Collinwood. Elizabeth greets her, and brings her in, as whispers and shadows close on the little girl.


	196. Note on the Judah Zachary sequence

Note:

The original story of Judah Zachary and Gerard Stiles had the problem is that we all knew that it was a repeat of the Quentin haunting David story. One wonders why the kids fall for the same ploy (OK, they replaced Amy with Hallie.) And then Barnabas has to go back in time...

Been there, done that.

Well, there is no trip to 1840 – too many time paradoxes (Hello, Edith Collins...). Gerard Stiles is in the present now, and Roxanne Drew might come back. As for Flora and Desmond... maybe there will be a short flashback. The romance between Quentin and Daphne (and Tad's presence) makes the line of succession chancy. Originally it would seem Tad died, and which meant that Gabriel's children inherited. Save Tad, or give Quentin more children with Daphne, and Roger and Elizabeth might end up as the poor relations (which was probably what happened in Parallel Time – Quentin, as the descendant of Tad is the lord of the manor, and Elizabeth and Roger are the poor relations). So, Tad died in the Civil War, there were no other children, and Gabriel's children became the heirs.

Time paradoxes give me splitting headaches.

As for Parallel Time, yes, I got planned a trip there, later on. But I am bringing Buffy Harrington and Cyrus Longworth/John Yeager to this time band. Another one of Lang's experiments. Lang is the gift that keeps on giving.

Now I am piling up the ominous warnings over Cousin Amy...


	197. Judah Zachary XVI

Elizabeth stops by the Old House to see Vicky. She asks her to turn over the power of attorney that Carolyn gave her.

She tells her that should she refuse, she can be charged with embezzlement.

"That would be false"

"Perhaps, but something could be made to appear so. I want you out of my life, and I cannot stand the idea of running into you at the factory. You are not to set foot in Collinwood ever, you understand?"

"Mrs. Stoddard, you are being unreasonable."

"Look where you live, Miss Winters. Everybody here is vulnerable, and my lawyers can find their vulnerability. Willie Loomis? He can be made to appear to have broken parole and be returned to jail. Julia Hoffman? She did not tell everything she did with Dr. Lang, and she did not get inmunity for it. She can go to jail. Barnabas? I can arrange for some people to come pound a stake in his heart."

Vicky is surprised to have her mention Barnabas' condition.

"Yes, Miss Winters. Megan Todd did tell me about him. And there are enough men here in debt who would like to have their debts taken care of. And you, of course, who can be framed for embezzlement."

"And Carolyn?"

"Carolyn has her own secrets that she wants to keep that way. I made sure of that."

"Burke..."

"He is away, and he too is vulnerable. No, marry him, and the two of you can leave town." she shrugs "Do not go against my wishes, Miss Winters, or you'll regret it. My ancestors ruled this town, and so do I."

She leaves Vicky and returns to Collinwood. She sits at her desk, looking at the application letters for a new governess.

She chooses one.

"Yes, Miss Harrington." She says. "You will do. You have enough in your past to be grateful for a second chance, and will know not to cross me in any way.


	198. Judah Zachary XVII

At night, Amy wanders through Collinwood, in trance. She is seen by Roger, who manages to guide her back to her bed.

"Just what we needed, a sleepwalker" he mutters to himself.

He sighs, knowing that nothing that he says to Liz will make her change her mind.

Maggie confides in Carolyn that Joe is being distant for the past days.

"I think that he blames me because I got him involved with that... creature. Same as you blame your mother."

"It is not the same thing. You were under the influence, but Mother knew what she was doing."

"I think that at some point I did know. I could have said no to Megan..."

"You were thinking of helping Joe, so that he would not risk again going to jail"

"Same as your mother thought she was helping you stay out of jail"

"Yes. There was some of that. But mother loved power more."

Buffy Harrington arrives at Collinwood and is greeted by Elizabeth.

"I trust that you will comply with my wishes and not be wilful."

"I aim to do my best for my charge"

Liz smiles, a bit cynically. "You were not always so devoted... well, this is your second chance. Do not lose it."

She then introduce Buffy to Amy. Buffy is struck by the otherworldy look in Amy's eyes. "She is still grieving for her grandma." Liz says.

At night, Joe has fallen asleep on the sofa, and Maggie tries to rouse him to get him in bed. This is when she notices the vampire bite in Joe's throat.


	199. Judah Zachary XVIII

Maggie confronts Barnabas, asking him what has he been doing to Joe that he now keeps secrets from her.

Barnabas is surprised, as he has not touched Joe, anymore than Maggie "You are still poison to me, according to Julia."

He promises to investigate.

Carolyn receives a phone call that leaves her agitated. "You cannot come here. Not now."

The person at the other end keeps insisting telling her that it would be much worse if she got caught.

Carolyn hungs up and turns to Tony. "It never ends. I thought that Buzz Hackett was the end of it... but..."

"But now someone else has turned up"

"She called herself Priscilla Simmons...whether that was her real name... she was the person to go to for fake ID.s"

"And now she is here. What does she want?"

"A place to hide until she creates a new false identity."

At the rehab center Jeff Clark has an unwelcome visitor. "You did not expect to see me again?" asks John Yeager.

"Lang is dead. His files are gone. I have nothing for you."

"Oh, but you knew certain things, didn't you? Things that you would not like your current employer to know."

"As there are things that you do not want the good Cyrus Longworth to know."

Clark jumps at Yeager, trying to tear off his eyepatch, but Yeager blocks him.

"Do not touch that eyepatch, do not touch the earplug, and I will let you live. What Longworth does not know will not hurt him."

He puts a knife to Clark's throat. "I could kill you now, but you might be useful yet."

Chris follows Joe in wolf form, keeping track of his movements, until he hears the rustle that tells him that Baranbas is there.

"Nothing to report." he says.

"I did not expect it. If he is meeting a vampire, it would not happen in daytime." Barnabas then turns into bat form and follows Joe.

Joe leads him to a supposedly abandoned shack and enters it.

"No one saw you?" Roxanne Drew asks him.

"I did not see anyone:

"I will need you to help me move again once more, and then I will release you to your wife... Do not worry, I will not keep you longer than necessary. But I must feed."

She bites Joe as Barnabas flies in.

"You!" Barnabas says.


	200. Judah Zachary XIX

Roxanne lets Joe go and faces Barnabas. "Long time no see."

"But you are dead..."

"Angelique made me live..this way. She thought she would get brownie points with you. Also told me that Julia Hoffman could cure me."

"Is that why you came?"

"No. I do not want to give my freedom. Because of what I am I got to do things that women in my time were not allowed to do...and some they are not still. I do not want to give that up."

She tells him that she is hiding from the FBI, who knows of her as Priscilla Simmons. "When you are what I am, fake I.D.s are a necessity, and I got to be good at it, good enough that others paid me for it."

She is now disappearing. She has buried her property in a cache, which she will leave alone for twenty, twenty five years, and dig out a cache of property she buried twenty years ago, She has travelled by impersonating the ghostly girl that gets a ride from drivers, borrow their coat, and leaving the coat over a gravestone. "A urban legend is very useful when you want not to leave traces."

She will remain in Collinwood for a while, for how long she will not tell. She will be another ghost roaming the cemetery and Widow's Hill ("and I may jump there and vanish a couple of times"). Let the trail grow cold and the FBI give up. Then she'll decide what to do.

"How about Joe?" Barnabas ask.

"He was useful. But I will let him go. You go too often to the same person, and you are in danger of turning them, and having to deal with him/her."

Barnabas is shaken, but glad to have her again in his life. He says that he will like to talk to her more.


End file.
